Balance
by rabbit and -v-Jinx-v
Summary: Hogwarts is under siege, and it's going to take everyone to find a way out of danger. Chapter 23, The end of the story, at long last.
1. Attack

            Balance:  by rabbit

            Disclaimer:  All this belongs to JK Rowling, except the tiny bit I stole off of JRR Tolkien.  No money.  No time.  No life…

            Chapter 1:  Attack

            Summary:  We begin _in media res_…

            **Please see the Author Notes in the last chapter for revision history.**

            ************

            They'd been told to go to the towers, all of them, to wait inside the dormitories until someone came for them.  It had been the shock of the prefects' lives when the stairs refused to lead anywhere but the highest reaches of Slytherin tower; and the second shock of finding a doorway that had never existed before, leading into the dormitory halls, was topped only by the third shock seeing all of the staircases turn away once the last student was safely on the landing.  The Slytherin prefects went to check the central staircase inside the tower that led down to the dungeons and the Slytherin Common Room, but they'd soon come back.  The news that the tower had sealed away those stairs  – so that there was no way down again but flying – had left even the Weasley twins quiet and worried.   

Once the Slytherins had gotten over their dismay (and had scattered to secure their possessions before letting the other students into their dorms), they had given in to the inevitable and even tried to be stiffly polite. Most of the students had started out willing to huddle inside, perched on beds or the stairs outside the dormitories, since the arrow slit windows didn't offer much of a view.  Harry, Ron and Hermione had been quick to follow the more adventurous souls up the narrow fire escape ladder to the top of the tower, to see what could be seen, ignoring the way that Draco Malfoy trailed suspiciously at their heels.  There were dozens of hand-holds and places to stand built into the roof, as well as a platform at the top, relics of the days when Quidditch had been played all around the castle instead of in the stadium.  Moreover, the roof seemed to change size to accommodate the crowd.  Hermione muttered something about fire escapes and magical size redistribution, but Ron just said the tower must be bigger on the outside than it was on the inside.  It was a good thing, too, because as the minutes turned to hours, even the Hufflepuff first years – known for their steadfast obedience – began to creep out onto the battlements to watch as the growing pillar of fire and shadow worked its way from the far edge of the Forbidden Forest toward the hillside and the lawns of Hogwarts castle.  

            Down in the castle foreyard, by the entrance that lead to the great hall, the students who were willing to hang over the castellations had seen Madame Pomfrey directing Filch, some ghosts, and half-a-hundred house elves in some kind of frantic preparation, the purpose of which only became clear when a party of the house elves dashed off into the forest and returned bearing stretchers with the crumpled figures of Professor Grubbly-Plank and the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher on them.  

            "Well," said Lee Jordan, watching as Madame Pomfrey met the procession and she and Filch rushed the injured man inside.  "That's two homework assignment less to worry about."

            Everyone who was close enough to hear him laughed, albeit nervously.

            "I don't think they're dead," said one of the Slytherins, who'd fetched a pair of Omnioculars from the dormitories  "They're still breathing anyway."

            "What is it?" "What's happening?" the students on the other sides of the tower craned their necks and chattered, and Lee tapped his own throat with his wand and invoked the "Sonorus" spell and explained in an amplified voice.  Then he asked, "Has anyone else got Omnioculars?  Can you see what's happening in the forest?"

            "I've got a Televisus Spectacalus spell on my glasses," a third year from Ravenclaw said, "It's not as good as Omnioculars, but you can see a little."

            Instantly, everyone with glasses cast the spell, including Harry, and turned to look at the edge of the forest.  They were in time to see the Muggle Studies professor come limping out, bleeding from a bad cut to the forehead, to be met by Filch and some elves with a stretcher.  Beyond them the dark leaves fluttered in an unnatural wind, and smoke obscured more than glimpses now and then of someone flying or the sparks of a wand.  The students without glasses hastily exchanged information about Quidditch field spells with the younger students.

            Between the Slytherins' Omnioculars, binoculars and spells, every student was watching by the time the bats and birds flew out in a chaotic cloud from the burning trees, and the werewolves loped across the grass to dive into the tenuous shelter of the lake.  From time to time more junior faculty members appeared, or were pulled out of the forest as the smoke grew nearer.  The Arithmancy teacher, Professor Vector, went back twice to bring out colleagues before it was her turn to come out of the trees on a stretcher.  Even the Centaurs abandoned the Forest, herding deer and unicorns and other small creatures before them to the relative safety of the hillsides. The senior Prefects whispered to each other about trying to evacuate if only they could get to the school brooms in time, and fretted over the ring of stormclouds that loomed in a suspiciously perfect circle around the edges of the valley.

            "Even if we can get the brooms," Cho Chang pointed out, "how many of us would know how to fly through that lot?  The first years have only had a few lessons."

            "We could double up.  Good flyers take someone with them."

            "And then what?  There's lightning in those clouds, can't you see it?  And if it's a natural storm, what's holding it back on all sides?  I'd hate to find a magical barrier by flying into it at full speed."

            "How about if we try sending an owl?" 

            Harry stopped listening, watching instead as the column of flame and shadow in the trees turned a rudimentary head and the shapes of horns and the gleam of flame red eyes showed through the smoke.  It was getting closer.  If it strayed much to the left it would come out of the forest close enough to endanger Hagrid's hut.

            Then the last of the faculty began to reappear at the edge of the wood, running.

            Hagrid was in the lead, carrying Dumbledore, and shielding him from a whip of fire that stretched out from the smoke and chaos.  The gigantic groundskeeper barrelled up the hillside towards the great gates that opened out from the curtain wall surrounding the grounds of the castle with Dumbledore looking like a small child cradled against his shoulder.   Moments behind them, coming past trees like a slalom skier, was Madame Hooch, Professor Flitwick riding pillion behind her on her broom.   Then Professor Trelawney appeared.  She ran like a scarecrow, her wild skirts hitched up into a practical knot at her waist.  Professor Sprout galumphed along beside her, tumbling once a complete turn but coming up to her feet and running again as if the contact with the ground had only strengthened her

            At the gate, they saw Dumbledore say something to Hagrid, and the caretaker stopped and put him down, and then stood there, arguing, as the other teachers in the group caught up and started to spread themselves out in a line along the wall.  Madame Hooch deposited Professor Flitwick on the wall itself, and then snapped her broom back in a move that made Harry feel a small pang of guilt for thinking how wonderful it would work in a Quidditch match.  She headed back for the forest.  Professor Sprout took position against the wall on the opposite side of the gate from Flitwick, so that Dumbledore was between them.

            Hagrid, reluctantly, stepped inside the gates, still shaking his huge shaggy head at Dumbledore.  He'd gotten as far as starting to close them when Hooch reappeared from the forest, with Professor Sinistra leaning against her back, eyes closed.

            Too many things happened at once to make sense of them just then.  Professors Sprout and Flitwick had turned to face the forest, and had started to glow.  Professor Trelawney was between the wall and the forest, pacing back and forth, and calling something.  Harry looked at Dumbledore and saw the Headmaster raise his arms, but saw too great Phoenix wings of spark and flame rise from the battered robes.

            "He's on fire!" someone groaned, but it wasn't true.  Harry tore his gaze away from Dumbledore and saw a great bluesmoke bird shape over Flitwick, and the head of a mistgrey badger where he knew Sprout was standing.  Somehow, the luminous, ethereal creatures were becoming part of the wall, and the wall was starting to glisten, slowly  growing higher.  Where Professor Trelawney was walking, he caught a glimpse of peacock feathers, and heard a distant, high screech of warning.

            Madame Hooch shot forward with her injured colleague, cutting past Dumbledore to skim inside the gates just before Hagrid closed them.  The wall of light flared and flickered, then steadied into a golden glow with the clang of the gates, but it grew no higher.  At the forest's edge, a small dark cat appeared, leaping impossibly fast across the ground even as it grew into both lion and Professor McGonagall.  Then Professor Snape appeared, running with a limp that somehow didn't slow him down, his black cloak snapping in the wind.  For a moment there was a suggestion of something reptilian about the Potions professor, but before it could be more than a suggestion a titanic creature, vaguely manshaped, but with horns on its head and long smoke-snake arms came out of the edge of the wood and blocked his way.  It seemed to define itself as it pushed past trees that burst into flame, growing more solid with each step.

            "What is that thing?"  More than one voice asked.

            "A balrog," Draco Malfoy's voice cracked on the word.  Harry spared him a glance.  Draco was usually pale, but now he'd gone dead white.  "I thought they didn't exist anymore."

            "There's a balrog in a Muggle book I know," Hermione said in a kind of awed squeak.  "It's a kind of a demon, isn't it?"

            "I think so." Draco said, staring at the combat.  And small wonder.

            Snape had turned desperately, flinging a small potion bottle at the feet of the balrog that shattered against a root.  Purple and green smoke billowed out surrounding the demon, and for a moment it faltered, but then a massive arm snapped out, flinging Snape back to collide with Professor McGonagall.  She fell, the lion fading, and Trelawney darted in between the balrog and its victims.  McGonagall recovered quickly, crouching to protect Snape and check on his condition as Trelawney absently dodged the balrog's blows and sent ineffective sparks of greengold at it with her wand.  

            "Funny," George Weasley muttered, turning his head away, "I should have thought I'd enjoy seeing Snape take the worst of it."

            "'S'all right, George," Fred reassured him.  "He's still moving.  Just… not… very fast."

            The balrog shook its head and took a step forward, ignoring Trelawney for the moment.  McGonagall came to her feet, her robes glimmering like armor of spun silver, as she took position between Snape and the demon.  She drew all eyes with her defiant dramatic pose, calling out something, her wand a brilliant orange, as she reached up into the air to extract a sword of flames from the shimmering heat waves of the balrog.  

When she swung it, the balrog staggered back.  For a long minute the flames of its being faded into embers, and it looked like it might be defeated. But then it reached out a great hand of shadow and pulled off the burning tip of a tree, shoving it into its mouth like a child with a favorite candy.  It's flames brightened again and it stepped forward to find McGonagall, now trying to help Snape get to his feet.  With a casual flicker of its whip it knocked them both to the ground again, and turned to pace towards the castle, leaving the shelter of the burning forest.

            Dumbledore flung up a barrier hand and cried out something so powerful that even on the battlements behind him the children could feel it's strength.  The wall of light pressed outward from the physical walls, blocking the balrog from moving forward, the ethereal phoenix, badger, and raven advanced with it, standing just inside the barrier, holding it upright as the balrog roared defiance and tried to force its way past.


	2. Now what?

Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: Not mine.  JK Rowling's. Iffen she borrowed stuff off of this all I'd be is complimented, and honestly, I'm not worth suing…

            Chapter 2: Now what?

            Summary:  The teachers aren't having much luck, so it's the students' turn.

            ******************

"It's no good," Hermione said to Harry and Ron, under the cheers of the less observant students.  "Harry, he can't keep that up."

            "Flitwick's helping him," Ron said.  "Look."

            It was true.  Professor Flitwick was still perched on the wall, his wand working back and forth, bluewhite streamers of energy coming from it to support Dumbledore.  From Sprout's side the streamers were green and brown.  But in the light from the magic, Harry could see blood on Dumbledore's robes.  And he had a feeling the spot was growing.  The ethereal guardians were fading away.

            He pushed his way into the group of seventh years and prefects. "We've got to help!"  He could feel Ron and Hermione following him, and Draco too.

            "Why?  Dumbledore's stopped it."  Fred Weasley said.

            "Yes, for the moment, but he's hurt.  And the other teachers are hurt too.  They need us."

            "I'm not going out there," said Draco, emphatically.  "It would be stupid."  A lot of the Slytherins nodded agreement, and not just the Slytherins.

            "I'm not asking you to," Harry said impatiently.  "Look, if we all cast the same spell at once, it will be a lot more powerful."

            "Even the first years?" asked Ginny Weasley, who'd been sticking close to her brothers.  

            "The more of us the better." Hermione said.  She turned to the nearest first year. "Do you lot know "wingardium leviosa" yet?"

            "Yes…we've tried it anyway," the first year said.

            "But what good would _that_ do?" Ron asked.  "I don't want that thing to fly over the wall."

            "We could drop it in the lake," Draco said unexpectedly.  "It's mostly fire.  We've got an old tapestry at home, about Flinders Malfoy defeating a balrog in it by forcing it into the sea."

            "Good idea," Harry said quickly, to forestall Ron from protesting the idea just because it came from Malfoy.  "Lee, you tell everyone, they can hear you."

            "Right."  Lee Jordan said.  "Just point out where you want us to put it, right?"

            "Okay," Harry agreed, taking a perch by Lee where he could see as the older boy began to explain the plan to the rest of the students.

There was a rush and some shoving as everyone tried to get a clear view, but the strange stretchability of the tower roof held. It wasn't a reassuring sight.  The ethereal guardians had faded away entirely. Dumbledore still held up a forbidding hand, but he was on his knees.  Hooch hovered just behind the bars of the gate, as if she were poised to open them the moment he fell and snatch him onto her broom to fly him to whatever safety there might be.  Flitwick was missing from the wall.  Sprout came into view through the bars of the gate, carrying him like a baby and passing him between the bars to Hagrid, who handed him off to a stretcher party of house elves.  Snape and McGonagall had gotten upright, and were working their way towards the Headmaster.  

            The balrog was preoccupied with trying to hit Professor Trelawney, roaring from the furnace of its fanged mouth with frustration.  It would swing its whip, but she would dodge before the blow could hit.  At last it drew a flaming sword out of it's own substance, and Harry could see Snape say something over his shoulder to McGonagall, who shrugged expressively as she turned to face the thing again.

            Just then, the hump of its back began to unfold into a skeletal framework of smoke, and a network of flame began to fill the gaps, forming huge batlike wings.

            "Oh, no!  It can fly!" Ron groaned.

            "Not yet it can't!  And look!"  Hermione pointed.  Snape had thrown another of his potion bottles, just as McGonagall pointed her sword and let fly a whirlwind of magic.  The balrog's flames went darker, and the wings more skeletal as her spell hit, and ropes of magic burst from the potion bottle to tangle it's arms and wings.  But even as it fought the bindings, it took a step closer to the school.  The sword arm came free, and the sword lashed out, felling both Snape and McGonagall.  Another step.  The ropes twisted around its legs, making it stumble, but if it fell now, it would land on Dumbledore.

            "Now!" Harry urged Lee.  

            "One!  Two!  Three!  GO!" Lee shouted to the school.

            "WINGARDIUM LEVIOSA!"  A small forest of wands moved through the air, and sparks of every color leaped from the high walls of the castle toward the balrog.

            With a screech of dismay, the demon began to rise sideways into the air, it's head twisting everywhere as it tried to find what was magicking it.  Up it went, it's flame eyes round, and the furnace-like maw of its mouth shaped into an "o", making it look like a cartoon of surprise.  For a long moment it looked as if it was growing, but at last the stumps of its legs ended in massive hooves.  It struggled against the magical bonds in the air, turning its sword into long claws without affecting them.  As they moved it toward the lake it reached out its free arm and raked the walls, knocking free stones that the teachers had to dodge, but it could hold on.

            "Quickly!" Harry urged.  Even with so many of them working together, the spell wasn't going to last long.  Fortunately, the lake wasn't far.  They drifted the balrog towards the middle of it, and Harry glimpsed the werewolves coming out of the water to flee again, and the tentacles of the giant squid flipping up once as it dived.  He let it hang in the air as long as he dared; hoping that the merpeople would have the sense to head for the depths of the lake as soon as they perceived the danger. "Let it fall!"  He shouted when he thought the balrog was too far from any shore for it's own good, and Lee Jordan echoed him instantly.  At the word, every student banished the spell, and the balrog dropped with a cry of dismay into the ice-cold waters of the lake.  A huge splash wave rolled outwards and flooded the shore all around the lake, rolling right over the walls and across the lawns.  Then steam and fog billowed up, mushrooming outwards and hiding first the shore, then curtain wall of the castle grounds, and then came up and obscured the grounds themselves.  Within moments, no one could see more than a foot or two beyond themselves.  

            They waited in the cooling fog, listening for the cries of the balrog.  When none came, the whispers started from student to student.  "Do you think we killed it?"  "I wish we could see."  "Do you suppose we should go and look?"

            Harry had had a glimpse of the rolling wall of water coming up at the embattled teachers, and he hated to wait for the fog to clear.  "One of us should, anyway," he answered the last speaker.  Unfortunately, his broom was locked in his trunk, to prevent anyone from mucking with it.  "I wish I had my broom."

"I've got mine," Draco said.  Harry thought he might be one of the few people close enough to see how Draco's throat muscles worked unhappily at the thought of flying in the fog, but at least Draco was willing to go.  And the important thing was that someone went, after all.  Draco knelt by trapdoor to the dormitories and called "Accio Thunderbolt" and the broom came quickly to his waiting hand.

            "But you're the only one who knows anything about balrogs,"  Pansy Parkinson protested, when Draco straightened up to mount the broom.

            "She's right," Hermione said.  "If we haven't killed it, and we need to do another spell, we'll need _you_ to help us figure out what the spell should be."

            Draco hesitated, and then held the broom out to Harry.  "Don't smash it into anything, Potter.  My father had it custom made.  It's the best broom in the school."

            Harry felt like his eyebrows were going to fly right off his head, but he took a careful grip on the broom and nodded to Malfoy.  "I'll fly down and check, and in the meantime, see if you can't think of another spell that's easy enough for the first years and that might hurt that thing if it's still there."        

            "Right," Hermione and Draco spoke together, and he grinned, feeling somehow reassured to know that they could work together when they really had to.

            "Did you see the look on its face?" he asked, laughter burbling up in his voice in spite of the tenseness of the moment.  He turned to go and heard the small giggles breaking out behind him.  It felt good.  At least the behemoth didn't seem so invulnerable now.

            The fog was all the thicker as he leaned out off the edge of the tower and let the broom take flight.  Draco was right.  It was a marvelous broom to fly on.  But Harry'd never flown in such thick weather, so he went carefully, skirting down along the walls until he reached the ground and then skimming just over the grass, following the paths he knew for certain led towards the lake.

            A dark figure loomed up out of the fog and Harry pulled himself to an abrupt halt, just missing a collision. He hovered and turned to see who it was.

            Snape.  The Potions professor was swaying on his feet, his robes soaked and bits of lake plants entangled in hair that looked like it had been scorched on one side.  Now that Harry was close enough to see, he could tell that under the cloak, Snape's frock coat had been transformed into black chainmail.  He had a black bandolier with potions bottles in it slung across his chest, too, although most of the pockets were empty now.  There was a bruise on his forehead, and his eyes were wild.  He stared at Harry for a moment and then lowered his wand.  "Potter," he identified hoarsely.  "I should have known it would be you."

            "Are you all right, sir?" Harry asked, wondering.  He'd never seen Snape so pale or unsteady.

            "You're supposed to be… not here."  Snape waved away Harry's concern. "All the students were…" he paused, to think it through, "…meant to be in the dormitories.  That's what the headmaster ordered, wasn't it?"

            "Yes, sir."  There was never any arguing with Snape at the best of times.  "I've been sent out to see if the balrog's dead, Professor.  We dropped it in the lake."

            "The Lake?  We?"  Snape shook his head as if it hurt.  "Potter, if you and Weasley and Granger have been ignoring orders again…" he started, but Harry didn't wait to hear how many points this was going to cost him.  He flew on toward the lake through the thinning mist, ignoring the call of "Potter?  Where did you go?  I was TALKING to you!"


	3. Aftermath?

Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: No, not mine.  Honest. Fun to play with, but the characters, settings and etcetera are all JK Rowling's toys except for the balrog, and I don't know if JRR Tolkien invented him/it or borrowed elsewhere anyway.

            Chapter 3: Aftermath?

            Summary:  We've won!  Haven't we?

            ******************

            Beyond the outer wall of the grounds, the paths were obscured by mud, and the damage from the water had confused any landmarks Harry could remember.  He slowed down some more and listened.  No balrog roars, which was good, but he thought he could hear a waterfall.  There weren't any waterfalls near Hogwarts.

            He flew on.  Without warning the ground fell away beneath him, rocky and mudslimed, and spotted here and there with the silver glints of dead or dying fish.  Harry tilted the broom down, and suddenly found himself below the mist.  He was in the deep irregular bowl of the lakebed, and it was nearly fifty feet down to the silver surface of the water.  Along the far wall there were three waterfalls, where streams fed into the lake from the mountains.  Harry could see merpeople clustering near the places where the cool mountain water reached the remains of the lake, and  caught glimpses of the squid's tentacles moving restlessly under the surface.  Of the balrog there was no sign.

            Harry flew over to the nearest clump of merpeople.  One of them popped its head up above the water to look at him and he landed on a rock near it.  "Are you all all right?" he asked, uncertainly.  "I'm sorry we had to put that thing in your lake, but it was all we could think of."

            "We are too warm, and some are injured, but we fled in good time," the merman answered, fortunately in English, although it's high squeaky voice was hard to understand.  "Where is Dumbledore?"

            "Hurt," Harry said.  "I'm going to go and find out how badly as soon as I tell the others that the balrog's dead.  It is dead, isn't it?  I mean, we couldn't see past the mist."

            "Not dead, but banished back to its own place and time," the merman said.  "And much diminished into the bargain.  I doubt it can return; and if it did, it would be no taller than your hand."

            "Thank you," Harry said with relief.  "Do you want Madame Pomfrey to come and see if any of your people need medicines?"

            "If we need aid, we will send for it."  The merman assured him.

            Harry turned the broom upwards and tried to find a path he knew.  He was still working it out when all of a sudden he heard a chorused shout from the rooftops and the fog vanished upwards, forming into a small cloud.  

            The other students were still waving wands, keeping the cloud intact, when Harry got close enough to shout, "It's gone!" to Lee Jordan and wave reassuringly to the others as Lee passed along the word.  He looked for a place to land, but every way he turned, the other students clustered towards him, taking up all the space to wave at him and cheer.

            .  "Potter! Potter!" someone started to chant, and Harry shook his head, waving at them to stop.   He didn't want the credit.  He didn't want _any_ publicity this year at all if he could help it.

            "It was Hermione's idea which spell to use," he shouted, to make sure he was heard by most of the tower.  "And Draco Malfoy's the one who figured out how to get rid of that thing.  Shout for them, if you want to."

            "MALFOY!" shouted most of the boys, and Draco was subjected to a friendly buffeting by the prefects.  "GRANGER!" replied the girls, and Hermione blushed at the accolade as the hurrahs began.

            "Keep your minds on the spell!" Cho Chang ordered fiercely,  "Lee, get them to concentrate!"

            "All right you lot," Lee called obligingly.  "We don't need our pet cloud for the balrog, but that forest fire doesn't look too friendly either.  Come on, just a little more effort here."  Most of the students chuckled, but turned their wands and eyes obediently.

            Harry hovered nearer to where Ron was standing.  "Check the stairs, will you, Ron?  If it's safe enough, they ought to have moved so that we can all get down again."

            "Good idea.  I don't like the look of those lightning clouds. They've gotten closer if you ask me." Ron nodded his head, since his wand hand was busy, down toward the lawns.  "The teachers are a right mess, too.  You'd better get down there with some of the ones who know healing spells straight away."  

            "Some of the house elves are hurt too," Hermione pointed out.  "They were coming out to help when the water hit."

            Harry turned his head to look.  Ron and Hermione were right.  The wave had left half the lawns deep in slime and mud, and there were small struggling figures all over the place.  Hagrid was bent over something near the Whomping Willow, and Trelawney was sitting on the wall, perfectly dry, putting away a purple parasol with a calm air.  Snape, McGonagall and Hooch were with Sprout, bent over Dumbledore.    As he watched, Snape took Hooch's broom and mounted it, heading back toward the forest, with McGonagall leaping into her cat form and snagging a ride on the bristles as he disappeared into the trees.

            The small cloud under the children's control burst into rain, dousing the highest patch of flames.  They cheered, but their cheers were met by the rattle of thunder from the approaching clouds.

            "We've got to get off the roof!" several people screamed.  

            "Don't panic!" Lee Jordan commanded.  "First years, get to the ladder. Everyone else, wait your turn."

            Draco struggled his way to the outer wall.  "Potter, I need my broom!"

            "Potter!" Hooch called from the ground, at full Quidditch referee volume.  "Get that broom down here!"

            Harry shrugged an apology at Draco and turned the broom towards the ground. "Coming!" he shouted back, and then hesitated glancing beyond the tower to the stormclouds.  They were definitely coming closer, and the lightning looked like something out of a very scary movie.  "Draco, brooms for the Quidditch players, to get the staff and the students inside.  Does Slytherin have enough?"

            Draco blinked, but nodded, his shoulders straightening.  "Of course."

            "NOW, POTTER!" Hooch roared.

            "It's up to you, then!" Harry told Draco and went to Hooch at the best speed the broom could manage.  "Sorry," he told her as he dismounted and she snagged the broom for herself.  "The merpeople say that the balrog's been banished, and Malfoy's going to try to get the Quidditch players brooms enough to help everyone inside," he reported quickly, trying not to stare at the diamond mesh pattern of burns on her left hand and the left side of her face.  

            "That's a start at least.  What on earth possessed you lot to all go out on the roof?  It's going to be coming down pitchforks in a minute!"

              "We helped," Harry said weakly, but he said it to her back.  She was already halfway up to the tower.  In a moment he could hear her taking command of the swarm of Quidditch players who'd acquired brooms.

            There was plenty to do on the ground, he told himself, after a moment of feeling lost.  And he still hadn't reported to Dumbledore.  Harry took a deep breath and turned to face the Headmaster.  Given how both Hooch and Snape had reacted, he wasn't sure if Dumbledore was going to approve of what the students had done.  "But it did get rid of the balrog," Harry reminded himself quietly.  Then he got a good look at Dumbledore and found something else to worry about.

            For the first time since he'd known him, Harry saw Professor Dumbledore looking as old as he was.  One arm was bound to his chest, and his robes had rips in them as well as mud and blood.  Professor Sprout was moving him, very carefully, onto a stretcher, but he blinked and even tried to smile as Harry came over to help.  "Harry…"

            "The balrog's gone, sir."  Harry told him, taking a careful hold to help Sprout move the old man.  "The merpeople told me it was banished, something about back to its own place and time."

            "Excellent."  Dumbledore said.  "And the merpeople?  I intended … bringing water … from the lake, not … the other way round."

            "Some of them got hurt," Harry admitted, trying not to think about how frail and thin Dumbledore felt through his robes.  "But I don't think any of them were hurt badly."

            "None of _them_ had trees falling on them," Sprout said briskly, tucking her cloak over Dumbledore.  "Unlike certain headmasters. Don't you look so worried, Potter.  He'll be fine once Madame Pomfrey sees to those broken ribs and that arm and leg."

            "Reminds me … of my Quidditch days…" Dumbledore said, with a ghost of his usual twinkle.

            The Weasley twins  and the two Slytherin beaters hovered suddenly nearby.  "We're to carry the headmaster inside," Fred said.  "Professor Sprout, Madame Hooch says can you and the others keep the lightning off the towers for ten minutes more, please.  And get the house-elves in."

            "Very well.  Keep him level.  And straight to the Great Hall.  Madame Pomfrey should be waiting there."  Sprout pulled Harry aside so that each beater could grab a corner of the stretcher, but she didn't stop to watch the way he did, as the four students carefully flew in formation to bring the stretcher to the main doors.  Instead, she went to the wall and called to Madame Trelawney and the two women began to work some kind of complicated spell together.


	4. Storm

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: Nope.  Still not mine.  Wish it were, I could use the money.

            Chapter 4: Storm

            Summary:  Not out of deep water yet.

            ******************

            Harry felt raindrops on his ears as he began to lever house elves out of the mud.  He could only manage to haul one elf at a time over to the stairs, where the still mobile elves were waiting to take them.  Hagrid was doing the same thing, only the big Groundskeeper was able to carry five or six of the things on his shoulders at a time.  Hagrid looked battered too.  His beard had a singed look to it – again with that odd diamond pattern, like he'd slammed into a red-hot chain link fence – and there was a bloodied length of cloth wrapped around one hand.  Harry worked his way towards him, wanting to ask questions, but the thunder was getting louder and louder, and the rain suddenly came down like water from a thousand spigots.

             He started to go inside when he saw a small hand waving from the mud.  He pried up the owner and found himself being hugged fiercely.  "I knew Harry Potter would find Dobby," said the overenthusiastic elf.

            "Hullo, Dobby," Harry sighed.  "Are you hurt?"

            "Dobby's leg is hurt, Harry Potter," said Dobby, displaying an ankle that was bent in a direction that would have had Harry yelling for an ambulance.  "But Madame Pomfrey can fix it."

            "If we can find Madame Pomfrey," Harry said, gathering up Dobby carefully in his arms.  He squinted through his rainstreaked glasses, trying to figure out which way to walk.  "Hang on."

            "No, no," Dobby said, after a step or two.  "Madame Pomfrey is _that_ way."  

            Harry turned the way that Dobby pointed.  Just then, the biggest lightning flash he'd ever seen in his life lit up the entire world.  It was like sheet lightning in every direction.  For a moment there were no shadows anywhere, and every raindrop flashed with light so bright it was blinding.  On its heels came a thunder clap almost too loud to be heard.

            Harry found himself down in the mud, his ears ringing.  He'd managed somehow to keep himself from landing on top of Dobby, but the mud was all over both of them.  He picked himself and his patient up carefully and started trying to find the castle.  It was awful.  He had to try avoid being close enough to anything that was being hit by lightning – and that was just about everything.  Poor Dobby seemed to be badly affected by the stuff too.  He stopped trying to help and just shivered in Harry's arms with his tennis ball eyes tight shut and whimpered.  Harry had never seen so much lightning.  It came from one direction and then another, making the shadows change direction this way and that – sort of like dozens of mis-timed strobe lights.  Between the glitter of the lightning lit rain, and the constantly changing position of the shadows it took Harry forever to find a pathway, and even with a line of flagstones to follow the going was frightening.  

            Harry had been just about ready to give up trying to get inside and just stay in a hollow under the steps he'd finally reached when Professor Trelawney found the two of them and escorted them in under the protection of her fringed purple parasol.  She was perfectly dry.  Harry knew he probably looked like a drowned and muddy rat as she ushered him down the entire length of the Great Hall carrying Dobby.  Fortunately, the thunder was so loud he couldn't hear what she was saying.  It was embarrassing enough having to be rescued.  Most of the students had been herded into the hall, and quite a few of them waved at him from the groups that the prefects seemed to be trying to collect them into.

            A big chalkboard, which usually hung in the corridor and reflected school announcements and such, had been magicked to another use.  It was hanging near the windows, and it looked like it had a list of every teacher, student, house elf, ghost, and pet in the entire school.  His own name was written in red, but as he found it, an eraser scrubbed it off and a piece of chalk flew up from the ledge to rewrite it in the same blue as most of the names.  There were several names in red, and a few in green.  A lot of the names were in yellow – nearly all of the elves were, for one, and most of the faculty.  Dumbledore's name was in yellow, Harry noted.  

            The stage end of the Hall had been transformed into an infirmary.  There were rows of human sized beds, and stacks of house elf sized bunks, and most of them were filled.  There was one really large bed, and Harry was surprised to see Hagrid sitting in it, looking very dazed and scorched, his hair and beard sticking out in all directions above striped pajamas.  He handed Dobby to Madame Pomfrey and watched as she magicked a chair into yet another house-elf sized bunk, and then went over to see how Hagrid was.  He was taken quite aback when Nearly Headless Nick suddenly appeared from half inside Hagrid's chest.  

            "What are you doing?" Harry exclaimed, rushing over, but the ghost – who seemed to be able to hear in spite of the thunder – smiled reassuringly at him.

            "Just cooling him down, Harry," the cultured voice was clear in spite of the racket overhead.  "Best thing for burns is a good chill, you know, and the poor chap took a direct hit of lightning."

            "Lightning?  Are you all right, Hagrid?" Harry thought better just in time of putting a hand on Hagrid's shoulder – the skin that did show was lobster red, and he didn't expect that it was any better under the pajamas.   But Hagrid just blinked at him slowly, and then managed a small fleeting smile.  He said something Harry couldn't hear, but Nick did, and passed it along.  "He says could you look out for Fang, please."

            "All right, I will."  But Harry lingered, still worried.

            "He'll be all right in a week or two," Nick assured him.  "But you'd best get something dry on, or you'll catch cold.  Especially since Peeves is acting up."

            Reluctantly, and keeping an eye out for Peeves as well as Fang, Harry started back down the hall, wondering if he'd be allowed up to the dormitory to get something dry to wear.  He was so busy looking under the tables for the dog, he didn't see who rammed into him with a hug from behind until after they'd already done it, and his heart almost stopped. It was just Ron, though, and Hermione right behind him.  Ron jumped up and down talking even though Harry couldn't hear him. Hermione produced a pair of purple fluff balls and reached over to put them over Harry's ears.

            "…need these.  Sorry about the color, but I think it's the only shade that they'll turn to."  Hermione was saying, and now that Harry had a moment to think, he saw that she and Ron were wearing the things too.

            "What are they?" he asked, touching one.  It wasn't nearly as soft as it looked.  The fluff seemed to be made of hedgehog spikes.

            "Hear-Muffs,"  Hermione said.

            "Ear-muffs?" Harry tried, wondering if he'd heard her right.

            "No, Hear-muffs, so you can hear. They're working aren't they? I tried to set them to block out most of the thunder, but they'll probably work best if you're looking at the person you want to hear."

            "Oh," Harry said. "Where did they come from?"

            "Thistles," Ron chipped in. "One of the Hufflepuffs grabbed the box of them that were in the Transfigurations classroom waiting to be turned to pincushions by the second years, and has been teaching the spell to some of the others.  Hermione was the first one to get it right, weren't you Hermione?"

            "There can't have been enough thistles there for everyone," Harry protested.

            "There weren't, but Professor Sprout's taken some of the others off to the greenhouses to get more." Ron pulled off his cloak to wrap it around Harry.  "You're sopping, Harry. Lucky you didn't get hit by lightning like Hagrid did."

            "Hagrid," Harry said, reminded. "He asked me to find Fang. Have you seen him anywhere?"

            "No," Hermione said, looking to the board. "But he must be here and safe. His name's in blue."

            "What do you mean, his name's in blue?" Ron asked. "What does the color have to do with it?"

            Hermione gave him a fondly exasperated look. "Blue's for the people who are in the hall and unhurt, yellow's for the ones who are here but hurt, and red's for the one's who haven't come in yet."

            "What about purple and green, then?" Harry asked. There weren't nearly as many names in those colors.

            "I'm not as sure of those," Hermione admitted. "They both include names of people who were here, but they've gone again. I think purple might mean that the person's all right, and that green means they've been hurt, but I haven't got enough examples to be sure."

            "Well, if Fang's here, let's find him, so Hagrid won't have to worry," Harry said, checking under another table.

            "I wonder why there isn't any orange?" Ron said, still looking at the board, while Hermione bent down to help Harry look.

            Hermione pulled a face, but it was more of an "I don't think you really want to know" kind of face.  Her answer was suspiciously casual.  "Well, some people don't even see orange, you know.  The American Navaho tribe doesn't even have a word for it in their language.  They just think of it as a kind of yellow-red, I expect."

            "Oh," Ron said, and bent to the search.  "Here, Fang," he called, and whistled.

            "He hasn't got Hear-muffs, you know," Harry pointed out. 

            "I know, but he's a dog, isn't he.  Their hearing's different from ours," Ron said equably and went over to the next row of tables.  

            Harry cornered Hermione.  "What do you _really_ think about the orange?" he asked her quietly.

            Hermione made sure Ron wasn't looking towards them.  "Madame Pomfrey's the one who witched the board.  I think maybe she witched it so that orange would mean people who are hurt badly, but she's made it so that _we_ see it as yellow.  She wouldn't want us getting more upset than we already are, but that way she can tell who needs the most help quickly."  Harry looked at the board, trying to see if Dumbledore's name was any redder than the other yellow names, but he couldn't tell.  Hermione followed his glance and then put a hand on his arm. "Honestly, Harry, I'm just guessing.  No one's explained the colors to us.  No one's had a chance to."

            "Maybe, but you're better at guessing than anyone else at Hogwarts," Harry said.  "And even if we don't know who got hurt the worst, there's way too many names in yellow.  I don't see a single house-elf in blue, do you?  And Trelawney and Madame Pomfrey are the only grown-ups in blue or purple.  Even Filch and Sprout are green.  And… what happened to Hooch?"

            "It was that really big thunderbolt," Hermione said.  "Crabbe fell off the tower and she tried to catch him just before he hit the ground.  I think her arms are broken."

            "He got hurt too," Harry said, finding the name.  He wished that Madame Pomfrey had witched it to have everyone grouped by color or by whether or not they were a student or teacher or what, and not just in alphabetical order.  There were so many names it was hard to count how many names each color represented.  

            "He probably would have gotten killed if she hadn't slowed him down," Hermione said.  "Trelawney and Sprout were bringing the pair of them into the Hall when we first got down here."

            Harry took off his glasses.  It was easier to estimate when he only saw colors and not words.  "Yellow and red take up nearly half the board," he said.

            "Yes, but a lot of the red names are for owls or pet cats or toads and things," Hermione said.  "And once we _get_ them into the Great Hall, they may all turn out to be blues."

            "Sure," Harry agreed.  "But who's going to organize it?  Trelawney?"


	5. Planning

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: I'm running out of clever ways to say that JK Rowling is a lot better writer than I am.  Just believe me when I say that she is the only person who deserves to profit off of Harry and Co.  I'm not even that happy about Warner Bros. Being legal holders of the copyright, to tell the truth…

            Chapter 5: Planning

            Summary:  The students start to get organized.

            ******************

            Hermione pulled a face.  She didn't like Trelawney any better than Harry did.  Less so, really.  But before she could think of an answer, Ron reappeared, dragging a cringing Fang by his collar.

            "I found him, Harry!"

            "Well done, Ron," Harry said, glad of the momentary distraction.  Poor Fang, he looked like the thunder was hurting his ears.  "Hermione, have you got another set of those Hear-muffs?"

            "No," Hermione admitted, but she pulled out her wand and a couple of Kleenex.  In a minute, she'd managed to transform them into a pair of fluffy cotton earplugs.  Fang wasn't sure he wanted to let her put them in his ears, but he allowed it, and then relaxed a little, leaning his big head on her thigh in drooling gratitude.  

            "I thought you needed thistles," Ron said.

            "I do.  These block out all the sound.  But it's better than the thunder," Hermione said.  

            Harry had had a chance to think while she was working, and to look around the hall.  Most of the prefects had Hear-Muffs, but a lot of the other students were still waiting, and the younger ones had put fingers in their ears.  Some of the second years looked ready to cry, and some of the first years _were_ crying.  Many of the older students were almost as wet as Harry was, but none of them were as muddy.  Hufflepuffs, Ravenclaws and Gryffindors were mostly all mixed up together, but the Slytherins were starting to gather a little ways apart, and a lot of them were looking at the door with stiff, worried faces.

            "Can you make a lot of those earplugs in a hurry, Hermione?  I mean, until they get the thistles they need?"

            "I could," Hermione said,  "if I had any more tissues."

            "Would toilet paper work?" Ron asked.

            She blinked.  "It might."

            "Right," Ron said.  "I'll take Fang up to Hagrid, and you and Harry pop down to the girls' loo and you'll be all set."

            "Would you mind going by yourself?" Harry asked Hermione.  "I think I'd better go talk to the prefects."

            "Whatever for?" Hermione asked.

            "They're just waiting for the teachers to tell them what to do, I think.  They haven't figured out the colors.  And they'll listen to me.  It's not fair, but they will."  He shrugged defensively, unsure that even Hermione and Ron would understand why he felt so sure that he could trade on the fame he didn't want to make the older students listen, and unsure himself of why he felt that he _should_. "I can't just… _not_ do anything."

            But Hermione nodded and smiled.  "Right.  Madame Pomfrey could probably use some help," she said, and twisted on her heel to head out of the hall.

            "And the rest of us could use dry clothes, blankets, food…especially the food," Ron suggested.  He tugged on the dog's collar. "Come on, Fang."

            Harry, left on his own, took a deep breath.  He knew he needed to talk to the prefects, but he had something else to do first.  He was pretty sure Ron wouldn't like it, but Harry had a feeling that he needed to _somehow_ keep the Slytherins from getting isolated from the rest of the school.  Which meant getting Draco involved.  "He did lend me his broom," Harry reminded himself, looking over to the shadowed corner where Draco was in huddled conference with a tall Slytherin.  

            He was thinking so hard about Draco, he was surprised when he suddenly heard Draco's voice across forty feet of the hall.

            "…can't fly in that."

            Harry blinked and lost the thread of the sound, but then he realized that the Hear-Muffs had to be responsible, so he focused again on Draco as he walked towards them.

            "…probably just waiting for the lightning to stop.  The Professor's too smart to take a stupid risk," the other boy was saying.  Harry frowned.  That sounded like Marcus Flint, didn't it?  Wasn't he…

            "But what if he's hurt?"  Draco's whine interrupted the thought.  He had to be talking about Professor Snape, Harry decided.  It was just like the Slytherins to talk about their housemaster as if he were the only teacher in the school.

            "McGonagall's with him, isn't she?  And it's not like there could be another balrog out there.  It'd be drowned in a minute."  Flint shook his head at Draco.  "He'd expect us to be too smart to take stupid risks too."

            Draco looked frustrated, but he nodded.  Then he glanced over and saw Harry coming and tensed up.  "Here comes Potter," he said to Flint, his chin coming up and his expression going colder.

            Harry tried not to let Malfoy's automatic snobbery get under his skin, but he waited until he was in normal conversational range before he spoke. No point in letting the Slytherins find out about how well the Hear-Muffs worked if they didn't already know.

            "You're a mess, Potter," Draco said, wrinkling a disdainful nose.  "What did you do, go wallowing in the mud?   Getting back to your roots?"

            "Not exactly."  Harry said.  This was going to be tricky.  Talking to Draco Malfoy was always tricky if you were trying not to lose your temper. "Were you able to get your broom back from Madame Hooch, Draco?"

            Draco shook his head.  "No.  Some fool dropped it in the mud.  You didn't happen to pick it up when you were out there crawling around, did you?"

            "No, sorry.  If it's broken I'll buy you another one."  Harry wasn't sure what prompted him to make that offer.  He'd much rather buy a broom for Ron.  But Draco blinked and then sneered..

            "I don't need you to buy me a broom, Potter.  Draco said.  "Buy one for yourself.  It still won't keep up with the one my father's going to buy me for Christmas."

            "Lucky you," Harry said, with feeling.  He'd have to forget about being nice and just get to the point.  "Listen, Draco, I've got to go tell the prefects what the merpeople said about the balrog.  I'd like you to come with me.  You know more about balrogs than anyone else here."

            Draco blinked again, and his sneer faded as he took a moment's consideration over Harry's statement, as if he were looking for a humiliating trap. "True," he said finally.  With a jerk of his head at Flint that was somehow a command to keep watching he came forward and fell into step beside Harry. 

            "It _is_ dead isn't it?"  Draco said when they were far enough away that Flint shouldn't have been able to hear them.  Harry had the feeling that knowing about balrogs was the first thing that anyone outside Slytherin had ever found valuable about Draco, and he was willing to milk it for the attention all he could get, but not if it meant losing the other Slytherins' good opinion of him.

            "Not exactly," Harry said.  

            "What do you mean, not exactly?"  A worried note crept into the cultured tones.  "Do you mean it's nearly dead, or undead?"

            Harry shook his head.  "The merpeople said it was said banished back to it's own place and time."

            Draco's shoulders came down the inch they'd gone up.  "Well, that's all right then.  So why do you need me?"

            "I think we're still under attack."  Now that he'd said it, Harry realized that it was true.  It wasn't the same sort of attack as the balrog had been, but it was definitely going to be a siege.

            "That's ridiculous, Potter.  Who'd attack Hogwarts…" Draco fetched up suddenly, and Harry had a feeling he was biting back "with me still in the castle." The blond boy looked uncertainly up at the lightning spangling the enchanted ceiling. "I think you're jumping at shadows, Potter.  It's just a bad storm.  What's the matter, lightning setting off that scar of yours?"

            "No.  As a matter of fact it isn't."  Which probably meant that the attack wasn't by Voldemort.  Still…  "But it's not natural lightning.  There's too much of it, for one thing.  And it _feels_ wrong."

            Draco shrugged one shoulder, half agreement, half "so what?"

            "With most of the teachers hurt," Harry began, and saw Draco's face narrow and still at the thought, "_we're_ going to have to be the ones who figure out what to do."  Harry sighed, and bit his lip, trying to think it through. "Do you think there's any chance that _we_ might have been … dragged along with the balrog somehow?"

            "Rubbish, Potter."   Draco said quickly.  "Balrogs live in smoke and flames.  This is lightning and rain.  That's water, in case you hadn't noticed."

            They'd reached the table where most of the prefects were gathered.  Neville Longbottom was also sitting there, waiting for more thistles to transform, but he'd obviously been watching them come and had heard some of the conversation.  "Something's still wrong, though," he said, "Look at Trevor."  His toad was hopping in a restless circle.  Draco just looked superior, but Neville went on.  "Animals can feel things we can't.  And the castle's trembling.  You can tell if you put your hand on the table."


	6. More Planning

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns all this lot.  I am just a silly, humble fanfic writer, who thinks that she should get all the credit for making my pen itch… Not to mention all the money, which I have no claim on anyway.

            Chapter 5:  More Planning

            Summary: The prefects get in on the act.

            ************

            Harry and Draco both tried it and then looked up at each other.  "It _is_ trembling," Draco said.

            "But what does it mean?" Harry wondered.

            "Nothing good," Neville sighed.  "I wish Professor Sprout would come back."

            "You're not the only one," said Hugh Hanley, a Hufflepuff prefect who had noticed the conversation.  Much to Harry's relief, the other prefects were looking at him curiously as well, and he motioned for them to come and sit at the table.

            "We can't just wait for the professors to tell us what to do," Harry said, once he had the attention of most of the prefects.  "Most of them are hurt,  except for Trelawney.  And I think Madame Pomfrey needs her help."

            "Thank goodness," muttered Cho Chang, from the far end of the table.  

            "Now, Hermione thinks that the colors on the chalkboard mean things."  He summarized the theory, and everyone looked worriedly at the board.

            "Professor Snape's name is in red," Draco observed unhappily. 

            "So's McGonagall's," Harry countered.  "I think we need to gather everything and everyone we can here into the great hall.  We should be getting some dry clothes and blankets and food, too.  We can send out rescue parties, to find anyone else who's still missing.  First things first.  There are enough of us to take care of most everything at once, but we've got to keep the first and second years busy.  Neville, can you take them down to the kitchen and have them make sandwiches or something for the rest of us?"

            Neville blanched.  "Kitchens?  Sandwiches?  I don't know how to make sandwiches."  At Harry's stare he shrugged.  "We have a house elf, Harry.  If I want a snack I just ask for one."

            "He's right, for once"  Draco said.  "That's servants' stuff, Potter."

            "There aren't any servants, Malfoy," Ron said, having just arrived in time to hear the comment.  "Look at the list.  Every single house elf is either in yellow or red.  And they're acting _very_ strangely."

            "What do you mean?" Cho Chang asked.

            "Look," Ron said, pointing.  They all looked.  At least a dozen house elves were walking in sideways circles on the wall above the beds, bumping into each other once in a while, but quite unconcerned by the law of gravity.  

            "All the frightened children in here aren't going to help," Hugh said.  "House elves get their magic from the auras of contented people.  Unhappy people make them nervous."

            "_That's_ what they get out of the bargain," came Hermione's voice from behind Harry.  She took the place beside him, stacking rolls of loo paper onto the table.  "Here, these are for making earplugs until we get more thistles.  The injured people don't need to listen to all that thunder anyway, and it will help the first years to relax.  None of the torches in the hall are working, by the way.  I expect it's the house elves who see to them, normally.  Do they really get their magic from our auras?"

            "Yes, of course," Hugh said.

            "Talk about it later," Harry said, interrupting them before it turned into a SPEW meeting.  "Ron, can you take Neville and get the first years earplugs and then take them down to the kitchens and bring back some food for us?  It would keep them out from under foot if they were all busy making sandwiches."

            "You should take at least one older student from each house," Cho Chang said.  "That way none of them will be able to sneak off without you noticing."

            "Right,"  Ron said, collecting some of the rolls.  "Come on, Neville. Hermione showed me how to make the earplugs when she made them for Fang."

            Hermione handed the rest of the toilet paper to Neville.  "It's Cottonus Obfuscatus, a simple Transfiguration spell.  You should be able to get one plug for each sheet, but I don't know if you should split them apart first."  She watched Ron go off with Neville with his arm across the other boy's shoulder.  "I hope the food will be edible," she sighed, and turned back to the party.  "Don't forget to send someone to help Madame Pomfrey, Harry."

            "I can organize that," Hugh Hanley said.  "Some of the sixth and seventh years have been studying healing spells."

            "Good.  Now the search parties, for the animals, the blankets, and to go out.  I think we can have ordinary groups for inside the castle, but we're going to need good flyers to go beyond the walls."  Harry bit his lip.  "Draco, I wanted to put you with the research party in the library, but you're too good a flyer to not be a searcher," he tried not to notice the sickening way that Draco preened at the compliment.  "Take a few minutes with Hermione and tell her whatever stories you know about balrogs.  Hermione, when you've heard what Draco can tell you, gather up a party of the brightest students from each house and take a party to the library.  Grab the books you think are important and then bring them back here.  If you wind up needing something else, take another trip, but don't get all caught up so that we think you need rescuing, all right?"

            "All right," Hermione said, nodding to Draco to step aside with her.  She paused after a step or two.  "Harry, don't forget, _none_ of the torches are lighting.  It's only the lightning that lets us see.  In rooms without windows it's dead dark."  

            "Thanks."

            "So every party will need someone who can cast a "lumos" spell," said Adrian Threadneedle, a Slytherin prefect.

            "Or torchbearers," said Rachel Young, from Ravenclaw.  "That would be a good job for second years."

            "We could probably get blankets from the laundry," Hugh suggested.  "That would be a good job for the third years."

            Harry nodded, but he felt like they were missing the point. "The thing is, I think every party should include people from every house.  Even the ones going to the dorms to get the animals and dry clothes."

            The storm of protests he was expecting didn't come.  The prefects looked at each other, biting lips and looking thoughtful.  "It makes sense," Cho Chang said after a moment.  "I mean, we all got sorted into different houses because we solve problems in different ways.  That might be important."

            "I guess so," said Adrian.  "But why should we bother?  I mean, there's probably clean clothes in the laundry where the blankets are.  And it doesn't make sense to risk our necks for a lot of animals."

            "It doesn't make sense for Madame Pomfrey to list all the animals on that board," Harry pointed out, "but she did it."

            "And if we've got organized parties going after them, it will keep the little kids from sneaking off to get them," Hugh said.

            "That's a point," Adrian nodded.  "I'll put together a party to go to the Owlery, then.  I know a way we can get there by secret passages, and if we can convince the owls to fly back that way, then they don't have go outside into the lightning."

            Harry nodded, and forebore to remind Threadneedle to take people from every house.  It was kind of scary, how quickly the prefects had agreed with him on that, which only made him feel like it was all the more important.  And come to think of it, they hadn't argued much about getting the animals, either.  Adrian did have a pretty magnificent barn owl, but it was almost as if his objections had been made because he thought someone ought to make them.  Did all of them have the same feeling of standing on a floor that kept tilting that he did?   He let the prefects sort out which seventh years to assign to the parties going to different areas of the castle while he closed his eyes and tried to sort out the strange feelings that were nudging into the peripheries of his senses.  It didn't work very well. The closest he could come to it was the feeling that you had after you'd spun on your broom too many times dodging bludgers.  Up and down were pretty obvious, but they kept trying to switch off inside your ears.  He gave up and looked up to Madame Pomfrey's domain, wondering if Dumbledore were awake enough to ask about the feeling – and whether Pomfrey would let him ask.  

            Madame Pomfrey was just placing a bundled up Professor Flitwick into the bed alongside of Dumbledore, having magically enlarged it.  Trelawney floated the blankets down over both of them and asked, "Will that help, do you think?"

            Harry realized that the Hear-Muffs were doing their trick again, and put all his concentration into listening to the two women.  

            "You're the prognosticator, Sybil," Madame Pomfrey said.  "And yes, I think it might help a little, but it would work better if you went and fetched Sprout back from wherever it is she's gotten."

            "It doesn't work that way, you know."

            Madame Pomfrey sighed, and smoothed the sheet a little over Dumbledore.  "No, it doesn't.  Not perfectly.  But until Severus and Minerva find their way back all I can hope to do is to keep him from slipping farther away."

            "All right then."  Trelawney pulled out her parasol and started down the length of the hall.

            Harry blinked and tried to catch his breath.  That had sounded an awful lot like Dumbledore was dying.  He slapped a hand on the table and got the attention of the prefects.  "We need to find Snape and McGonagall.  Quickly."

            "But didn't they go into the Forest?" Rachel asked.

            "I'm not sure that anyone should go out into the lightning," Cho said reluctantly,  "At least, not until we've checked all the places in the castle first.  I don't like the idea of getting a rescue party injured looking for people who aren't even there."

            Harry looked up at the enchanted ceiling, meaning to see how much lightning there still was, since the flickering of the flambeaus and the flickering of the lightning were hard to distinguish between when you couldn't hear the thunder.  It _was_ easing off a bit.  But there was still a lot of it.  "I think it might be getting a little better," he said, trying to be optimistic.  "And I'm not sure how much longer we can wait."

            "Only a little," Cho said.  Most of the prefects were looking up now.  "What's that?" she asked, pointing to the far end of the hall.

            "I don't know," Rachel said.  "It looks… like… a tornado?"

            "Oh, great.  Who's going to fly in a tornado?"

            "It's not a tornado," said Hugh decisively.  "It looks more like… like that little whirlpool you get when you're draining out the bath."

            "What do you suppose is draining away, then?" Adrian asked.  "The clouds?  The storm?"

            "What if it's the air?" Rachel asked, nervously.

            Harry watched the small swirl.  Wherever it moved, the ceiling seemed to be going to stone, and it gave him an unhappy feeling in the pit of his stomach.  "What if it's the magic?"


	7. Rescue Party

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns this lot.  Honest.  Really.  Wouldn't dream of being foolish enough to claim what's not mine.

            Chapter 7: Rescue Party

            Summary:  _Someone's_ got to go find Snape and McGonagall…

            ************

            Harry brought his eyes down and found himself staring straight at Draco Malfoy, thirty feet away, who had apparently looked up from his consultations with Hermione just moments before.  And by the look on his face, he'd just realized the potential of the Hear-Muffs.  Harry beckoned him to come over, and kept looking around, checking for any other little swirls, and thinking furiously.  The sight of Madame Trelawney, nearly even with the table where he was standing, gave him an idea, and he went to intercept her.

            "We're going to try to go out and find Professor Snape and Professor McGonagall," he told her bluntly.  "And we need to know that spell you were doing with Professor Sprout to keep lightning off."  

            "Mr. Filch has gone to fetch them," she said reassuringly, but glanced automatically at the chalkboard as she said it and went pale.  Harry looked too.  Filch's name had been re-written in red. "Oh, dear.  There was nothing in the stars about this."

            Harry took her arm and pointed up at the tiny swirl.  "Look.  Something's going very wrong.  We need to find them."

            She turned her narrow face upwards and went quite still.  "Water, fire… it'll be a windstorm next, and if we get as far as the earthquake I'm not sure …" Her eyes came back down, huge behind her glasses, to look into his.  "Yees," she said slowly.  "Yes, you should go and look.  But I'm afraid I don't know the lightning spell.  I was merely supporting Professor Sprout."

            Harry bit back a swear word.

            "One of the advanced herbology students might know it," Trelawney went on, a note of uncertainty creeping into her voice.  "I think it was developed to keep lightning away from valuable trees.  I'll go and fetch her, shall I, and we'll find out."  She pulled away from Harry and went on out of the hall, walking much faster.  Harry thought she might break into a run as soon as she passed the doorway and the students couldn't see her.

            Hugh Hanley had come up to listen to the conversation, and he tapped Harry's shoulder to get his attention.  "If anyone knows the spell, it'll be Fritz Gehrendts.  He's planning to be a forester when he leaves Hogwarts."

            "Is he a good flyer?"

            "He could be on the house team if he wanted, but he says he'd rather study."

            "What's going on?" Draco had arrived.  "What spell?  What are we doing?"

            "The spell's to keep off lightning," Harry told him.  "We're going to find Snape and McGonagall and fetch them back.  Are you in?"

            "If I had a broom, I would be," Draco said, frustration on his face.

            "Fair's fair.  You can use mine," Harry told him.  "I'll borrow one off of Fred or George."  He looked back to Hugh.  "We still need a Ravenclaw."

            "You'll have one," Cho Chang said, joining them.  "I'm going to ask Elisa Mountjoy to help you.  She's the only decent flyer I can think of who can work healing spells without checking in with Madam Pomfrey every five minutes.  You might need that."

            "Right.  Tell them to meet us at the door to the Great Hall in five minutes, and we'll start for the top of Gryffindor." Harry didn't wait to watch them off, but turned and started walking toward the table where Fred and George Weasley were helping Ron and Neville fit up first years with earplugs.   Draco trailed along beside him, frowning.  "Draco, can you think of anything we're forgetting?"

            "Brooms for those two, unless you want to waste time fetching their own.  Why go to Gryffindor at all?" Draco asked.

            "Because it's the highest tower," Harry said.  "The one with the best view."  Harry bit his lip, but decided to go on with describing his vague plan.  "Haven't you noticed that the Hear-Muffs let us hear a lot farther than we ought to?"

            "Well… yes," Draco admitted.

            "I think, if we're lucky, we might be able to hear them if they're calling for help, as long as we're concentrating on them."

            "If they're calling for help," Draco said, pointing out the weakest point of the plan with ease.  "Still, it's worth a look.  We'll be wasting a lot of time climbing all those stairs, though.  We should double up with some of the Slytherins who have brooms and fly up the staircases.  It would be faster."

            "That would be good, if you can arrange it," Harry said.  "I want to bring Fred and George up there too, though.  I've got a job for them."

            "The Weasley Terror Twins?  What is it, setting fire to the tower?" Draco asked, rolling his eyes as he parted ways with Harry and headed for Marcus Flint and the other Slytherin Quidditch players.

            "I hope not," Harry muttered, and went to pull on George's arm.

            "Hey, Harry?  What's up?"

            "Some of us are going to go look for McGonagall and Snape," Harry said, "I need to borrow your brooms, and I'd like you and Fred to see if you can't rig some kind of beacon or light at the top of Gryffindor so we're sure to be able to find out way back."

            George blinked.  "Lee Jordan said you were going to have us all looking for the animals and bringing them here."

            "That too, but it's not as important as getting the teachers.  I think Dumbledore's life may depend on it."

            "I hope you're pulling my leg," George said.

            Harry shook his head, soberly.  

            "Oh, bloody hell.  All right, we're in."  He reached around and tapped his twin on the shoulder.  "Come on, Fred, we've got a job to do."

            "Okay," Fred said cheerfully.  "Don't ruin all the food, Ron," he advised, scruffing Ron's hair in passing.

            "Where are you going?" Ron asked, looking at Harry.

            Harry wished he had time to explain it all, but then Ron would want to come – and it was bad enough risking four necks, let alone more.  "Tell you later.  See if you can't make up something hot to go with those sandwiches, though.  I'm starving."

            Ron rolled his eyes.   "Something hot.  Like what?"

            Harry shrugged.  "I don't know.  How about tea?"

            "Tea," Ron nodded, reluctantly and turned back to what he was doing, although Harry could hear him talking to himself.  "Tea.  Right. That's just hot water with stuff in it.  How hard can it be?"

            George and Fred had taken either side of Harry and towed him along relentlessly.  "I hope you know what you're doing, Harry," Fred said.  "Leaving Ron and Neville in charge of getting us food?  I can't imagine what they'll come up with."

            "Some of the first years might be able to cook," Harry made a weak rejoinder.  He looked ahead and saw Adrian Threadneedle having words with Draco and an assortment of quidditch  chasers players from every house.  

            He concentrated.  "…and when you've dropped off the team that's going after the teachers," Adrian was saying to the players, "bring back the Gryffindor animals.  I'll be organizing parties for Slytherin and Hufflepuff next, but if you get back sooner than they do I'll send you on to Ravenclaw.  Remember, every animal you can find is one less name for us to have to go searching for, right?"

            "Right," the chasers answered.

            Angelina Johnson spoke up then, "Shouldn't we get blankets and our own brooms, too?"

            "The animals are the first priority," Adrian said.

            "We could put the animals in the blankets,"  said a Hufflepuff chaser.  "And the more brooms we get down here, the more teams you can have going at once."

            Adrian pulled a face, but he nodded.  "Just don't get distracted by side trips.  If you see something that needs doing, send someone back to the Great Hall to let us know what you're up to so we don't have to send out another rescue party."

            Harry and the Weasley twins reached Adrian about the same time as a tall, burly Hufflepuff boy and a slightly built Ravenclaw girl.  Harry knew that the boy was Fritz Gehrendts – Fritz' family was from Barbados and he had skin that nearly matched his black robes.  He was also the only student in the school who bid fair to coming up to Hagrid's height at nearly two meters.  He sometimes assisted Professor Sprout in the greenhouses, and Harry had talked to him once or twice about Herbology. Elisa Mountjoy was only familiar from the library, though.  Harry had seen her there fairly often, but she almost always had her nose in a book, and he didn't think that even Hermione had had call to talk to her.  He nodded to both of them and held out a hand.  "I hope they  told you what we're going to do," he said.

            Fritz reached out a hand to envelop Harry's.  "Go out in the wet and bring back the teachers still out there," he confirmed.  "Hugh says you need someone to work the lightning spell for you."

            "Right."  Harry said.

            "Can't he just cast it on us now?" Draco said, coming over to join them and looking slightly sour, like things weren't quite going his way.  Or like he was beginning to get scared.

            "Then who's going to cast it on the professors when we find them?" asked Elisa quietly.  "I think that they must be hurt, to have not come back so far."

            "Hurt or lost," Harry said.  "I was out there, and it's terribly easy to get mixed up with all that lightning."  He jerked a thumb at the Weasleys standing behind him.  "Fred and George are going to see about turning Gryffindor into a lighthouse, so we can find our way back."

            "Then you ought to get going," Adrian said, herding them impatiently towards the team of flyers he'd assembled and glancing nervously towards the ceiling.  They couldn't help following his gaze.  

            The swirl was still there, still rotating, and now Harry thought he could see a tiny thread of spinning light coming down from it, into the hall.  It seemed to not be stable enough to keep its existence for more than a second or two at a time, but it lasted long enough for Harry to predict where it would touch down eventually.

            On Dumbledore.


	8. Up

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer:   JK Rowling owns the toys.

            Chapter 8: Up…

            Summary: Finding a way through the darkness isn't always easy.

            ************

            Once they were out into the corridor, Harry got on the bristles of a broom behind one of the Ravenclaw chasers and hung on.  It wasn't nearly as comfortable as riding solo, but he figured he could put up with it for as long as he needed to.  Two of the players had no passengers, and they took the front and middle of the line, casting light spells to illuminate the darkened halls as they flew along.  They couldn't go very fast – not as fast as the brooms would allow anyway – because the shadows did strange things around them, and made it hard to recognise landmarks.  When they came to the stair tower, they stopped for a moment, to let the last few brooms and riders catch up.  Harry looked up into the darkness, trying to see if there were anything up there besides stairs, and heard a distant caterwauling.

            He tapped his chauffeur's shoulder and pointed up,  "Do you hear anything?"

            More of them looked upwards.  "Sounds like a… a banshee, maybe," someone said.

            "Sounds like a cat with a rock tied to its tail to me," said Draco.

            "Or a lot of cats," said Fritz.

            "Maybe," Elisa said, bringing out her wand and pointing it upwards.  "Illuminae Solarum!" she called, and a bright beam of sunlight shot towards the top of the high chamber.  

            It was so bright Harry was startled and looked away, trying to blink away the purple and green column at the edge of his vision.  Some of the others had better luck, and some worse, but everyone seemed to end up shouting about it.

            "Look, the stairs are all stuck."

            "That's not eyes, is it?"

            "Relax, I think that's the cats."

            "I can't see _anything_,"

            "It's over there."

            "Wait'll my eyeballs stop trying to pop out of my head, will you?"

            Harry kept blinking, letting his eyes adjust gradually by looking at the walls instead of up toward the light itself.  As his gaze went higher, the ghostly retina burn images began to fade and he grew more and more aware that he wasn't seeing what he should see.  

            "Look at the walls," he said quietly, and the clamoring around him stopped abruptly.  "Do you see anyone in the portraits?  Anyone at all?"

            The column of light wavered and Draco said, "Not you!  Just keep the light going while we look."

            "All right," Elisa said.  "But look quickly.  This isn't the easiest of spells to keep going, you know."

            "I don't see _anything_ moving," said a Hufflepuff chaser.  "Not stairs, not portraits.  _Nothing._"

            "Just those eyes up on the stairs," said one of the Slytherins.  "We'd better be right about them being cats."

            The chamber went dark as the spell failed and they all fell quiet.  Harry had the feeling that every single one of them was looking up towards the stairs, and he wondered if anyone else saw the greenish glint of pairs of eyes looking over the edge of a staircase.  "We'll find out soon enough.  But maybe we should have some paralysis spells ready, just in case."

            "But you two stick to providing light," Draco recommended to the two who'd been doing the lumos spells before.  "We don't want to end up hitting each other."

            "Right," Harry said.  "Wands ready then?  Let's go."

            Harry'd already begun to suspect it, but the ride upwards through the stair chamber proved that he really _really_ hated not being the one in charge of the broom.  It wasn't that it was a bad ride, or that they came too close to hitting anything – it was just that his own reactions would have been different, and he had to be careful not to lean too and tip over both of them.  He distracted himself by keeping an eye on the eyes.  To his relief, as they got closer, he could see that they were indeed mostly cats.  About eight floors up, the stairs had failed to come to meet each other properly, and a gaggle of cats, rats, frogs, and of all things, Lee Jordan's tarantula, were waiting impatiently on the upper landing.

            "Well, that'll save some time," said George Weasley cheerfully.  "Looks like the animals are trying to get to the Great Hall on their own."

            "I think the cats are in charge," said Fred.  "Look at that tabby keeping that toad from wandering off."

            "I'll start ferrying them over to the next set of stairs," volunteered one of the lightbearers.  "You go drop off the rescue party."

            "All right," the other lightbearer headed up and the rest followed quickly, so as not to be flying in the dark.  At last they reached the highest landing, and started down the corridor toward the entrance to Gryffindor.  Harry wondered how they were going to get in, if the Fat Lady weren't there to take the password.  He thought maybe they could go outside and up somehow, but in the event, it wasn't necessary.

            The Fat Lady's portrait hung empty in its frame, standing ajar.  They could see the flicker of firelight down the passageway into the common room.  Harry slipped off the back of the broom and stood a little uncertainly on the stones of the passageway as everyone else dismounted as well.

            The feeling of wrongness was worse up here.  Harry hoped that the collywobbles in his legs had to do with riding on the uncushioned part of a broom, but it was obvious as he crawled through the passageway into the common room that the tower was shaking even worse than the Great Hall had been.  He felt very strange, like he was changing size from moment to moment.

            The non-Gryffindors were trying not to crane their necks around too obviously; curiosity being enough to overcome even the strangest feelings for at least a moment as the rest of the group got in.  There were more people than Harry had thought, or they were moving around.  He took the chance to stand nearer the fire, hoping to warm up a little before he had to go outside. The flames dipped and leapt up again, with odd colors in their hearts.  It was mesmerizing, patterned without patterns, like the interplay of quidditch players below him in the first wild seconds of a game.

            "Best brooms for the seekers," said a voice, and Harry blinked as Oliver Wood handed him a broom.  Hadn't Oliver…

            "Hey!  Harry!" George's shout from the stairs caught his attention.  "Come on.  Let's get you lot going."

            "Coming," Harry said, clutching the broom.  Draco, Elisa and Fritz were with George already.  George led the way upstairs, passing Fred coming down with a stack of blankets.  

            "No sign of any more animals," Fred said.  "All the cages have been opened."

            "Maybe it was the cats," George said.  "Meet me in the attic once you've got rid of that lot.  I'll need your help getting that beacon thing up to the roof."

            "No problem," Fred said.  "At least there's plenty of wood for it in the common room."

            "Going to be fun carrying it up all the stairs, though," George said, and started on up.  "Harry, get a broom for Draco and a dry cloak on, while I get brooms for Fritz and Elisa from our rooms, right?"

            "Right."  Harry turned towards his room and Draco followed.

            "Is it always this shaky in your tower, Potter?" the blond boy asked.

            "Never," Harry answered.  He wondered if he should take the time to change the rest of his clothes and decided he should at least put on dry socks.

            Draco bit his lip and settled on the bed to wait, staring around unabashedly.  "You'd think they'd try to make things _different_ from house to house," he said as Harry found his spare shoes under the chair.  "But all they do is give the beds different color curtains."

            Harry shrugged, and pulled on his winter cloak.  "Maybe they buy them wholesale," he said.

            "Buy them?  Wholesale?  What's that supposed to mean?"  Draco's sneer wasn't quite as effective when he was frightened, Harry noticed.

            "It means we're all the same, as far as Hogwarts goes, I think," Harry said, going over to the coatstand to get the broom he was lending Draco.  "We all start out with the same advantages."  He frowned as he took it into his hand.  Hadn't _his_ broom been locked somewhere?  Maybe he'd just forgotten.

            "All of us but you," Draco said bitterly.  "I expect you'll get all the glory this time, too.  Everything always falls into your lap, doesn't it?"

            "What?"  Harry forgot about the puzzle of his broom and looked at Draco.  "What are you on about?  You're the one who's rich."

            "And you're not?  Weasley doesn't buy all that candy you always have on the train.  You're famous, too.  I can't even look at the Daily Prophet without seeing you mentioned somewhere, even if it's only the letters column."  Draco's face turned pinker.  "I don't _like_ you, Potter," he grumbled, looking at the floor.

            "I don't like you much either," said Harry, surprised at the outburst.  "But this isn't about liking or not liking each other.  It's about surviving, isn't it?"  He held out the broom, handle end first, so that Draco could see it.  "Look, I'm not interested in the glory.  I just want to go and get the teachers, so they can keep whatever's wrong from getting worse."

            Draco looked up at him, mouth pursed, but thoughtful.  "Even Professor Snape?  Even though you don't like him?"

            "I don't have to _like_ him to know that he's one of the smartest teachers Hogwarts has probably ever had," Harry said, surprising himself a little.  He shrugged. Maybe Draco just needed a Slytherinish enough reason to do something right.  "Look, think of it this way.  I'm coming along to make sure that you rescue McGonagall, and you're coming along to make sure that I rescue Snape."

            Draco looked at Harry with narrowed eyes, thinking for a long moment.  "All right," he said slowly, at last, and took the broom.  "Let's go."


	9. and Out

Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: Go JK.  I'm too sleepy to fight back anyway…

            Chapter 9: …and Out

            Summary: And after much exposition, the rescue party finally gets underway!

            ************

            George and the others were waiting for Draco and Harry at the bottom of the fire escape stairs.  Fritz cast the lightning ward on each of them before they climbed up the metal ladder, and when they got out onto the roof, Harry was glad of it.  The rain was easing now, but St. Elmo's fire danced across the stones, and lightning bled off from the towers sideways and down, to skitter across the leaded roofs of the classrooms and halls below.

            "I'd better ward the tower, too," Fritz said to George.  "Especially if you and your brother are going to be up here with a metal beacon frame."

            "That's not a bad notion," George's voice cracked, and he looked surprised, like a kitten who's gotten a noseful of milk from a saucer.  Harry looked – in this light, George looked younger than Harry was – but then the lightning struck nearby and the effect faded.  George grinned at Harry and handed him a backpack.  "You might need this," he said, his voice back to its usual note.

            "What is it?"  Harry asked.

            "Emergency supplies.  Everything Fred and I thought we might need to get out of trouble with."  George said.  "There's muggle fireworks in there, in case you need to send up a signal without letting any thaumivores know you're about."

            "Thaumivores?" Harry repeated, pulling the backpack on.  It was heavy enough.

            "Magic eaters.  Snape and McGonagall were headed towards the Forest last I noticed – and there's rumors about that sort of thing."  George grinned, "But it might just be a story to keep us out.  At least you won't have to worry about werewolves."

            "That's something at least," Harry agreed.  "If we send up a firework, it means we've found them.  If we send up a second one, it means we need help.  All right?"

            "And if you send up three of them, I'll bring the whole team," George agreed.

            "Hey,  Harry," Elisa pulled on Harry's sleeve.  "I think Malfoy's got a direction for us."

            "Good," Harry went with her to the parapet, where Draco was looking out over the lightning lit landscape to the forest.  He tried to line up himself with Draco's intense stare and deliberately made himself think of McGonagall and Snape.  He turned his head a little, left, then right, and suddenly, he heard a distant conversation.

            "…nevertheless, I think that you are underestimating his potential.  He does fine in Transfigurations class."

            **"But in Potions he fails to concentrate."**  Was it the distance, or did Snape's voice sound strained?

            **"Rather the opposite of a certain student _I_ remember."**  McGonagalls voice was a little clearer, but it was still faint.

            Harry rested his hand on the stones and pointed his finger in the direction he was listening so he wouldn't lose it and then started looking for landmarks that way.  If they went on a line to the right of Hagrid's hut and about ten of the biggest trees over, then they should be on the right track.  Elisa had done much the same thing, he noticed.  He described his results to her and she concurred.

            "It matches me, too," Draco said, relaxing from his taut concentration with a sigh.  He shook his head like a fly was buzzing at him.  "They sounded funny when I first heard them.  Wrong."

            "Do you think it's some kind of illusion?" Elisa asked.  "A trap?"

            Draco bit his lip.  "No,"  he said slowly.  "But.. I think we should go carefully. I think maybe the Professor's hurt.  And I don't think we'll be able to listen and fly at the same time.  It's too hard to hear them."

            Harry agreed.  "We'll fly down to the edge of the forest then," he said.  "We can stop and listen there, and then work our way along a little at a time.  It might get easier to hear as we get closer, too."

            "With any luck," Elisa said.  "Fritz," she called over to their last rescueman.  "Are you ready to go?"

            "Just a mo'" he said, casting the lightning spell on Fred, who had just come up the tower.  "Have you noticed that the lightning's getting less?  There's more time between flashes."

            "That's all to the good, isn't it?" Elisa said.

            "Yes, except that it's so dark.  Should the sun have gone down so soon?" Fritz asked.

            Harry reached over to pat his shoulder, feeling vaguely surprised that he could.  "It's just taken a while to get everything ready, I guess.  And the clouds are hiding the moon."

            "Better take my lantern then," Fred said, handing it to Draco.  "I can get another one from the tower."  He went over to help George with something, and Harry thought for a moment that he loomed half-a-foot over his twin, but then he blinked, and the two boys were the same size as each other, the way they always were.

            The queasy feeling in his stomach was getting worse.  He wanted off the tower, _now_.  "Come on," he told the other three.  "Fritz, follow us."  It had to be better to be flying.

            But when they launched themselves from the wall, the brooms didn't "catch" until they'd already fallen several stories.   Draco and Harry got control first, and Elisa and Fritz managed seconds later.  They all pulled up, hovering, a few feet above the roof of the hospital wing and looked at each other with huge eyes.

            "I thought you said this broom was a good one!" Draco shouted at Harry.  "What was that all about?"

            "I don't know," Harry said, equally shaken.  "It's like they were jinxed or something."

Fritz frowned  "If that whirlpool thing _is_ draining magic, maybe we flew through it.  All the brooms were affected.  But they're working now, aren't they?"

            "They seem to be," Draco muttered bad temperedly. "I wish I had mine."

"We're outside.  Why don't you call it to you?" Harry said hotly.  It wasn't his broom's fault that Draco'd gotten a scare.

"I'm not casting a summoning spell for anything called a 'Thunderbolt' right now, thanks," Draco said sarcastically.

"'Thunderbolt'," Harry repeated just as sarcastically.  "Do you always give your brooms stupid names, Malfoy?"

"Leave it!"  Fritz roared, taking advantage of his much larger size to intimidate the two younger boys into stopping their argument.  "We've still got a rescue to do!"

Harry and Draco shut up.  Quickly.  Before Fritz decided to bang their heads together.  They hadn't even _known_ he had a temper.  It was like walking across a field and suddenly finding that you were standing on a volcano.

"Let's fly closer to the ground," Elisa said, nervously.  "If something else is going to go wrong, I don't want to be fifty feet up in the air."

            "Good idea."  Now that Fritz had taken charge, he kept it.  "Draco, you were the first one to get the direction, and you've got the lantern, so you lead the way.  Harry, you stick near Elisa, in case she has more trouble with her broom.  I'll take the back.  All right?"

            "All right," they chorused, and took their positions.

            Draco took a careful path, going down from roof to roof, until they reached the end of the building and made the drop to just above the grounds, instead of going in a straight line the way that Harry would have if he'd been able to trust the brooms.  It took a little longer, but not much, and it wasn't long before they were hovering near the tree that marked the line from Gryffindor tower to where the two professors had been talking.

            They landed and tried to listen again.

            It was Fritz who pointed the way first, and with his lead, Harry caught the voices again, still faint, but a little clearer.

**            "…easier if you just let go."**  That was Snape.

            **"No, it wouldn't,"** McGonagall said.  **"And you know it."**

            **"Yes, Minerva.  So what shall we talk about next?  We're running out of students to slander."**  Snape sounded tired.

            **"I don't know.  Something cheerful?"**  So did McGonagall.

**            "Cheerful?" **

            "How about the party we're throwing when the Weasley twins graduate.  Verna has already promised to bring some of her special summer squash…"

            Harry looked at the others.  They were all lined up the same way, but it was harder to mark landmarks among the trees in the forest.  "Draco, give me the lantern."

            "What for?"

            "I'll go into the trees for a distance, and you use a lumos spell on your wand to let me know if I'm too far left or right.  Make circles.  The direction you're going at the top is the direction I should move to.  And straight up and down when I'm right.  That way we won't get too far off track."

            "Might work," Fritz said.  "Worth a try, anyway.  Don't go too far without us, though, Harry."

            "I won't," Harry said.  He never much cared for the Forbidden Forest at the best of times, really, and he had to remind himself that all the creatures had been chased out by the balrog.  "When I don't think I can go any farther without losing sight of you, I'll wave the lantern from side to side, all right?"

            "Right."

            The plan worked pretty well, although Harry had to go around trees a lot.  And it didn't take him very long to get to the point where the forest would obscure the others.  He landed on a fallen log, thinking that that might save the broom's 'fuel' somehow while he waited, and gave the signal.

            And then something touched his leg.


	10. Into the Woods

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer:  Anything you recognize isn't mine.

            Chapter 10: Into the Woods

            Summary: The rescue party has to make a hard decision.

            ************

            Harry was so startled, he dropped the lantern as he jumped to his feet and turned to see what had touched him.  It went out.  For a moment, everything was dark except for two glowing red eyes near his feet.  Then the lightning flashed and Harry could breathe again.  "Mrs. Norris!"  He held out his arms, and the scrawny caretakers cat jumped up into them, butting her head against his chest.  Never in his life had Harry expected to be glad to see her, but now he stroked her soggy fur and wished that he had some of Hermione's earplugs for her.  "I'm so glad you're not a werewolf," he told her.  "What are you doing in the forest?"

            She yowled at him and set her teeth gently around his thumb, tugging at it twice in the same direction before pausing to look up at him, and then doing the same again.  

            "Are you trying to answer me?" he asked, and she nodded as if she were human.

            "Harry!" Elisa shouted, catching him by the shoulder.  "Are you all right?  What happened to the lantern?"

            "I'm sorry.  I dropped it," Harry said, looking up to find Fritz and Draco just arriving.  "Look.  It's Mrs. Norris.  She just came out of nowhere."

            "Mrs. Norris?" the others exclaimed.  Draco frowned.  "Filch must be here somewhere," he said.

            Immediately the scrawny cat yowled again and leaped from Harry's arms to Draco, who caught her with an astonished look before she touched her nose against his cheek and then jumped once more to land on the ground and pace up and down, yowling with impatience.

            "I think she wants us to follow her,"  Fritz said.

            "But what about Professor Snape?" Draco protested.

            "Maybe she knows where he is,"  Elisa said, already following the cat on foot.  Fritz bent to pick up the lantern and lit it before following the Ravenclaw girl.  Draco and Harry exchanged worried looks.

            "We'd better go too," Harry said.  "I don't think Mrs. Norris would have come far."

            "At least she's sort of going the right way," Draco said.  "But I don't think she's taking us to the teachers."

            "I don't either," Harry admitted.  "But if Filch _is_ out here…" he shrugged.  "If  it takes too long, we'll keep going after Snape and McGonagall."

            Draco looked at him, curious.  "That doesn't sound like you, Potter.  I thought you were trying to rescue _everyone_, right down to the rats."

            "I am," Harry said.  "But without Professor McGonagall and Snape, I don't think there's going to be any point."  He looked after Fritz and Elisa, thoughtfully, and realized that the lantern had stopped moving.  "Look."

            They caught up after a few seconds of flight and found Fritz and Elisa kneeling by a fallen tree, Mrs. Norris pacing along one of the branches.  And under the tangle of branches, just visible in the lantern light, they saw Filch, looking even more pained than usual and quite unconscious.

            "I think," said Draco, "that this is going to take some time."

            "I think it's going to take more time than Dumbledore's got," Harry said unhappily.

            "What do you mean?" Fritz asked.

            "Madame Pomfrey was talking to Professor Trelawney.  She said she needed Snape and McGonagall to keep Dumbledore from slipping away," Harry said.  "We've got to hurry."

            "We can't leave Filch alone here.  He's hurt," Elisa said.  "Look, I'll stay.  You three go on."

            "But we need four of us," Harry protested weakly, hating the idea of leaving Elisa alone with the unconscious caretaker.

            "No, we don't.  Not really.  Elisa can stay here and I'll get some help from the castle.  Look, I've found Filch's lantern. You can take this one," Fritz said, handing it to Draco.  "It's you two who are the seekers.  You seek out the professors and then signal for more help if you need it."

            "Signals!" Harry exclaimed, pulling off the pack George had given him.  "I forgot."  He found two of the muggle fireworks and gave them to Fritz.  "You stay with Elisa and use these.  George will send help when he sees them."  

            "Great," Fritz took the fireworks.  "Listen, you should leave blazes behind you as you go, so you can find the way back more easily.  One go ahead like before, but as the other one catches up, stop every few trees along and set some leaves glowing with the foxfire spell.  Do you need me to teach it to you?"

            "I know it," Harry said.  They'd learned it in Herbology.  Wasn't it last month?  Or had it been earlier.

            "So do I," Draco pulled on Harry's arm.  "Come on."    He started scanning for the voices again, his thin face intense.  "Come on, Professor, say something."

            Harry gave once last glance to Fritz and Elisa, already discussing exactly how to go about rescuing Filch, and then took position beside Draco, listening.  Nothing.  Nothing. _Nothing_.  He closed his eyes, listening all the harder.

**            "But it doesn't make sense!"**  The voice was younger than his own.  Could there be another student out here?"

            **"Try again,"** That was McGonagall.  Harry raised his hand quickly, to mark the right way, and hesitated when the young voice came again.

**            "I thought teachers were supposed to explain things."**  It wasn't _quite_ a whine, but it did sound petulant.

            **"If you'd done the reading…"**

**            "I did.  It didn't make sense.  It kept on going on about this stupid notion of 'looking deep'."**

            "You look deep, Mr. Snape, so as to understand what it is that you wish to change.  If you do not understand the nature of the matchstick, you cannot coax it into becoming a needle."

            _Mister Snape?_  Harry opened his eyes and looked at Draco, who was pointing the same way as he was, and looked just as flabbergasted.   Harry swallowed his uncertainty and double checked, concentrating along the line of his pointing finger.

            **"…Potions make sense!  How am I supposed to know what's in a hedgehog if I'm not allowed to taste it?"**

            "Well, if it's Potions you prefer, then, give me a list of the contents of the Potions cupboards."

**            "If I _have_ to,"** the young Snape voice said.**  "All right.  Aconite.  Also known as monkshood and wolfbane.  It's a poison, but can be used for…"**

            "We'd better hurry," Draco took to the air.  "Don't let me get too far astray, Potter."

            "Right."  Harry kept pointing the way with one hand and got his wand ready with a lumos spell.  It was fairly tricky, actually, keeping an eye on Draco's lantern, and sending him left or right, and still "tuning in" now and then to the distant conversation.

            **"Brighteye.  Used in vision potions mostly.  Brightfeather.  A substitute for pheonix feathers, but not reliable unless it's been combined with Flamewort..."**  With each name, at least, Snape's voice seemed to get a little older.  It cracked as he was in among the 'M's, just as Draco stopped to wave the lantern from side to side.

            It was bloody frightening, trying to fly through a forest in the dark, even with the will-o-the-wisp of the lantern ahead.  Harry found himself grateful for the lightning, and the excuse to stop every so often and light up a bank of moss on a tree.  He looked behind him as he went along and realized that the foxfire was making a kind of a line that they could follow if for some reason they stopped hearing the teachers.

            Draco was already concentrating when Harry caught up, and he'd had the bright idea of using a stick stuck into the ground to mark the direction so his arm wouldn't get so tired.  He handed off the lantern to Harry without a word, but Harry paused to catch his breath and listen for a moment before he went on.

            **"Sweet William, which in spite of its name is not sweet, is used for…"  **At least Snape sounded like Snape now.  Harry wished Professor McGonagall would say something, but he didn't want to take the time to wait for her to get a chance.  

            When he reached the limits of his turn with the lantern, he waved it at Draco and then found a notch to rest it in while he found a stick to mark the new heading and lined himself up as best he could to listen.  His nose itched with the smell of wet burned wood, and he tried to ignore it as he turned his head, listening…

            **"…canthus,"** said Snape with a familiar dryness.  **"There are other things in the cupboards, Minerva, but you're not authorized to know what they are."**

**            "Not authorized?  I like that,"**  Professor McGonagall sounded relieved.  **"Nice to have you back, Severus."**

**            "I wish I could say that it were nice to be here,"** Snape said**.  "Why haven't you let go, yet?"**

**            "Because I won't," **McGonagall said flatly.  **"You've got your eyes open again, haven't you?"**

**            "I did,"** Snape grunted, and then sighed. **"There's no magic down here, Minerva."**

            There was a silence.  **"That's not good," **she answered, while Harry tried to figure it what Snape meant by 'down here'.  

            There was no answer from Snape.

            Draco landed next to Harry and started to pick up the lantern, but Harry waved at him to listen, wondering if he'd somehow lost the conversation.  Then, after a long while, McGonagall spoke again**.  "How's the leg?"**

**            "Still attached."**

**            "And the arm?"**

**            "Strangely…"** Snape seemed, for once, to be at a loss for the right word.  **"Unattached,"** he settled for at last.  **"It doesn't hurt at all.  Not even…when it _should_.  It's as if there's nothing there."**


	11. Seek and Ye Shall Find

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer:  JK Rowling's toys.  I just snuck into the toybox. 

            Chapter 11: Seek and Ye Shall Find

            Summary:  Draco and Harry finally find McGonagall and Snape.

            ************

            "That doesn't sound good."  Draco grabbed the lantern and took off again while Harry jammed his direction finding stick into the mud so he wouldn't lose the direction.  He was about to double check the angle, when he saw the lantern light suddenly drop to the ground and the lightning showed him a glimpse of Draco falling too, not more than twenty yards on.

"Draco!" Harry yelled, and ran forward, slipping once or twice on the wet leaves of the forest floor.  He got there in time to see Draco getting to his feet again and pulling his cloak free of the tree branch it had snagged on with a vicious jerk.  Harry caught up to him and paused to catch his breath.  "Draco, are you all right?"

"I'm fine!" Draco growled, rubbing at his right arm with his left.  "Just bruised is all.  Do you see the lantern?"

            "Lumos," Harry cast the light spell on his wand and tried not to think that it was getting dimmer.  He didn't see the lantern.  The forest had begun to be scorched here, and the mud was black with soot.

            Draco was looking for the lantern too, a scowl on his face.  "Dammit," he complained, "why did they have to go off into the Forbidden Forest anyway?"

            "I don't know," Harry said, deciding to let the smaller boy grumble if it made him feel a little less hurt and scared.  Draco looked very young, just now.  "Maybe they thought there was another balrog."

            "Balrog."  Draco stopped moving and his scowl grew more thoughtful.  "Hang about.  The Professor flew back to the forest after we'd already gotten rid of the balrog, right?"

            "Yes," Harry said,  "and McGonagall went with him.  They flew in just to one side of where the balrog came out."

            "Well they wouldn't have flown into the fire, Potter," Draco said exasperatedly, much more his usual self. "But they might have flown alongside it."

            Harry found the lantern at last and pulled it free of the mud.  "What are you on about, Draco?"

            "Look," Draco said.  "Balrogs don't live in the same … same _place_ as we do.  They've got their own world.  But sometimes the layer between the worlds can be broken through, right?"

            "The merman said something about sending it back to its own time and place," Harry agreed, waiting to see where Draco was going.

            "What if Dumbledore sent McGonagall and Professor Snape back to make sure that the nothing else was following the balrog?  They'd go back along the line the balrog took, right?"

            Harry saw it.  "Back along the line of the forest fire!  We can follow the burn!"

            "It would be faster than trying to mess about with the lantern and foxfire," Draco said.

            "I like the foxfire," Harry said as he set the lantern to rights and re-lit it.  "It gives us a quicker way back out."

            Draco nodded, recovering his broom from a bush.  "And we should still check now and then, to listen.  Just in case."

            "Right."  Harry set a patch of foxfire glowing between them.  "You go left, I'll go right.  We want to find the main path of the fire.  If you find it, wave your wand up and down and I'll come to you."

            "And I'll do the same."  

            It was Harry who found the path the balrog had taken, and while he waited for Draco to come to him, he set another patch of foxfire aglow and took a moment stare at the destruction revealed by the intermittent lightning.  Whole trees had been knocked aside, and charred logs still steamed in spite of the rain.  He was hovering near a huge hoofprint, half filled with rainwater and he shivered, realizing afresh how big the monster had been.  He had to search a bit, to find a stick that didn't go to cinders in his hand, and he'd just started listening for the teachers when Draco arrived.

            **"…never _was_ much of a conversationalist…"**  Harry heard McGonagall and checked his direction quickly.  The burn was taking them mostly the right way.

            "I think this will work," he told Draco.

            "Good.  Let's go."

            They flew shoulder to shoulder, as if they were both chasing the snitch, but for once Harry felt glad that Draco was a good flyer.  The balrog had completely cleared a path nearly ten feet wide, really – beyond that there were still trees standing, however scorched they might be – but in that narrow channel Harry and Draco could make more speed, risking overrunning the lantern light when the lightning came more quickly, and only slowing a little when it didn't.  They stopped once, and once again, to leave a patch of foxfire in their wakes, and Harry was just considering stopping a third time when he heard words, as if on a gust of wind.

            Draco pulled up, signaling a pause, and Harry stopped to hover and listen too…

            **"…still haven't finished reading that book Albus lent you."** McGonagall.  She sounded thoughtful, her voice just audible, but wobbly, like a radio with bad reception, to the boys.

            **"I planned on reading it over the Christmas break,"** Snape said.  **"When there weren't so many students to interrupt me."**

            "We must be getting close," Harry said, excitedly and Draco hushed him and led the way down the slope where the balrog's path crossed a streambed.  When they came back up the other bank they flew along, both listening hard.

            When Snape's voice came again it was very quiet.   **"I'm getting cold, Minerva."**

            Harry swallowed and bent closer over his broom to cut the wind resistance.  Snape was never cold.

            **"Think warm thoughts,"** McGonagall told him.

            **"Do you know,"** Snape said drily,  **"I don't think I have any."**

            **"After the day we've had?"** McGonagall seemed to be teasing, ever so gently.  **"I should the think that demon was warm enough to last a while."**

**"True enough."**  Snape snorted derisively, but his voice when he spoke again was very tired sounding**.  "In a way it's too bad.  This can't be the happily ever after you'd envisioned."**

            **"Not the tall, dark mysterious stranger I'd envisioned at any rate,"** McGonagall 

            Snape chuckled.  **"I'm tall and dark!" **he protested.

            **"But just not strange enough,"** McGonagall said fondly.

            **"Finicky female,"** Snape accused her in an amused tone that Harry had never thought he would hear from the man.  **"I suppose you prefer that black and white tom that's been hanging about Gryffindor tower."**

            "You mean that alley cat that attached itself to Jamison over the summer break?"

            **"Yes,"** Snape said**.  "Mister Mistofolees, she calls him.  Man of mystery."**

            McGonagall made a rude sound.  **"Doesn't he wish!"**

            Both teachers laughed.  But when McGonagall began to collect herself, Snape kept on laughing, helplessly, almost hysterically.  Harry and Draco raced against the circle of the lantern's light, risking a little more speed in spite of snags and stumps and the suddenness of rocks in front of them.  Another rise, and they could feel the brooms struggling now to gain altitude.  Harry wished for more lightning, even a glimpse beyond the lantern light would ease the feeling that he was about to smash into something awful.

            Snape's laughter was coming more ragged now, weakening into gasps for air.  **"Oh, please,"** he said, tears in the words, **"please, Minerva, let go."**

            The ground dropped away below the lantern as the path led them into a deep bowl of a hollow, and the boys tipped their brooms downward to follow. Into the light came rocks, smashed trees, a glimpse of something bright…

            **"I won't,"** McGonagall said, nearly as wrought up as Snape was.  **"And I wish you'd …stop, _stop_, _STOP_!"**

            At the very last second, Harry realized that the brightness was McGonagall's armor where she sprawled on the ground, and that she was yelling at him and Draco.  He reached out and got a handful of Draco's cloak, pulling the other boy with him as he slewed his broom sideways to a sharp halt.

            Draco lost hold of broom and lantern, and his weight dragged both of them and Harry's broom to the ground, but in the moments as they fell they could see as if in some kind of slow motion movie.

            The lantern arced to the ground, illuminating McGonagall's grim face and the deathlike grip she held onto the trail of black cloth she was keeping all her weight upon to keep it from slipping over the tree root she'd hooked one elbow around for security.  The broom went on straight, over her head, into a darkness that suddenly swirled with colors too tinted with black to be identified.  It smashed the wooden handle into splinters and then smashed the splinters into nothing, bristles following with sparks of brilliant ebony as they vanished as well.  And then the lantern went out.


	12. On Edge

Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: I've gotta make up a standard disclaimer that'll let y'all know whose stuff is whose… Ah, think it through!

            Chapter 12: On Edge

            Summary:  Finding is easier than rescuing.

            ************

            Harry and Draco lay on the ground, breathing hard, staring in shock at the place where they'd almost gone the same way as the broom that didn't exist anymore.

            "Minerva!  MINERVA!  ARE YOU ALL RIGHT?"  Snape roared in the darkness.

            It was Draco who recovered first, casting "lumos" on his wand and getting a dim glow in response.  It wasn't much light, but it was enough for Harry to see that Draco was nursing his elbow.

            McGonagall was staring at the two of them over her sleeve, her eyes gleaming cat-green in the dim light.  "It's all right, Severus," she said, not at all calmly. "We've been found."

            "That's the second time I've landed on that arm," Draco grumbled. "Couldn't you have managed to save our lives without breaking anything, Potter?"

            "You're welcome," Harry said, disentangling himself from the other boy and crawling forward to the lantern.  This time when it had fallen the glass had finally broken, but only on one side, and Harry set the lantern upright and cast a spark spell against the wick to relight it.

            Nothing happened.

            "Spells don't work well here, Mr. Potter," McGonagall said.  Harry bit back a swear word and started digging into the pack for the muggle matches he'd seen earlier.

            "Potter?" Snape asked querulously. "Is that Potter up there?"

            "And me, sir," Draco said.  "Malfoy."  Draco hitched himself forward, carefully, toward the place where McGonagall was hanging onto the cloth, keeping his head low, and with every movement the light of his wand faded a bit.

            "Hold on," Harry said.  He'd found the matches and to his relief, they worked.  The wick sputtered a little before it caught, and the flame writhed uncertainly until Harry thought of shielding the broken side of the lantern from the wind, but then the light steadied and illuminated the rainswept clearing.

            Or rather, it illuminated half a clearing. The black barrier/swirl/whatever it was had cut off everything – trees, rocks, earth and all – for as far to either side as Harry could see.  McGonagall was lying across a massive tangle of roots, some of them from a rowan tree that had been partly uprooted and was leaning against a neighboring ash, but mostly those of an oak that was still standing, despite being truncated by some massive axe.  The cut had come out of the sky nearly vertically, taking off limbs and splitting the far side of the trunk downwards to some fifteen feet above the ground, and leaving the whole tree looking dangerously lopsided.

            Draco kept going forward, a little more quickly now that he could see that the trees were cut off well above his head.  He had to go under the trunk of the rowan tree to reach the edge without crawling over McGonagall, and all Harry could see was the back end of his cloak and his shoes for a moment before he backed out from under the trunk again, still favoring his arm, and twisted to look back at Harry.  "I can't see.  Bring the light, Potter."

            "Right," Harry said slowly, trying not to stare as Malfoy's face shrank visibly down to the size it had been when they were both first years.  It was hard to tell, given the cloak, whether the rest of Draco was shrinking too, but Harry suspected from the sudden looseness of his own shirt that Draco wasn't the only one changing.  "Draco…do I look funny to you?"  His voice cracked on the question.

            Draco made an impatient noise, but he looked, and then his eyes widened.  But he took a breath and managed an almost sneer.  "No worse than usual, Potter.  And we've got a rescue to do, remember?"

            "Bring the light," McGonagall reminded Harry, and he stumbled forward and then took a breath and went more carefully.  She was changing as well, although not in size.  The silver in her hair faded to auburn as her face smoothed and then resurged as she began to look more and more like herself.  "It's all right, Mr. Potter.  We're in an area that has just been knocked loose from our proper place in time, and the effects are strongest near the perimeters.  Once Professor Dumbledore and the others summon this part of the forest back to Hogwarts, we shall all be our proper ages again."

            Harry shook his head, "Hogwarts is here with us," he said.  "The whole castle.  And Dumbledore's dying."

            "Dying?"  That was Snape, and his voice cracked too.  "What do you mean, dying?"

            "Madam Pomfrey needs you… both of you," Harry explained, picking his careful way across the roots with the lantern.  There was a short branch above McGonagall's head on the oak tree – one that looked as if it had been broken long ago – where he thought he could hang the light.  "I heard her telling Trelawney…"

            "Professor Trelawney," chorused the adults, and Harry sighed a little, half grateful to know that they were still all right enough to care about something as stupid as forms of address.

            "Yes, her…  Madam Pomfrey said that _Professor_ Flitwick and _Professor_ Sprout could help keep him from slipping away, but _Professor_ Trelawney said it didn't work like that, and they both said they needed you two."  Harry waited for a moment for his legs to get longer before stepping over McGonagall's head.  He hung onto the bark of the tree with his left hand, getting into position on the shoulder of a root to reach up with his right hand to the place he wanted to hang the lantern.  He wasn't quite… was almost… was tall enough to hook the handle over the end of the branch now!

            He almost lost his balance, and grabbed onto the tree with both hands, looking outwards, past the edge, into the exploding anti-colors of the space beyond the world.  It wasn't just black nothingness – not exactly.  It was more like the patterns that played behind pressed eyelids, only wrong and worse and warped into nothing that made sense for more than a moment at a time.  For a second, for an eternity, it beckoned, promising sweet oblivion…

            "Potter!  Pay attention!"  The harsh shout raked across his ears and Harry shook his head and looked down into the chalk drawing face of Professor Snape, twisted up to look into the light.  "I'd appreciate getting out of here."

            Harry nodded, swallowing hard.  It was a little better looking down – even considering that it looked like someone had taken a giant shovel and cut off the side of the world with it.  Dirt had crumbled away in some places, and Harry could see a trickle of water coming off a shortened root to fall and splash into black-glinting destruction far below, but on the whole it seemed as if he was standing at the edge of a giant scooped out piece of land that curved away underneath him gradually so that he couldn't even guess how far down it went.

            Snape was trapped by his cloak and the tangled roots, and to Harry's eye it looked as if some of the earth had fallen away around him, leaving him tucked in a little from the edge of destruction.  His position looked awkward and uncertain to begin with, and it only got more so when he started go younger.  If McGonagall let go, he'd never be able to hang on for long, and as Harry watched he realized that Snape was still wearing the chain mail.  Even if it were tangled in the roots, it would pull free soon enough.

            Draco had managed to get a little closer to the rowan.  "Can you reach my hand, sir?" he said, stretching out as far as he dared.  A rock came dislodged from under him and bounced off a root and out.  It was destroyed, the same as the broom had been, but Harry noticed that it wasn't destroyed directly near the edge.  Draco had backed up, unwilling to drop the entire edge off onto Snape, and was swearing.

            "Shut up, Malfoy," Harry said. "I've got an idea.  Stay there and watch while I toss rocks over Professor Snape."

            "That's not going to help," Draco said sourly while Harry clambered back over McGonagall.

            "It is if we can figure out how far out is safe.  There's rope in this pack, you know."

            "Rope?  How unusually practical," said Snape, surprised.  "Five points to Gryffindor for thinking of it, Mr. Potter."

            "You'll have to give it to Fred and George," Harry said absently, starting to lob dirt clods gently out over the trapped man.  "It's their pack."

            "Then let us hope that it's a rope that hasn't been rigged to do something surprising," said McGonagall drily.

            "I don't think so," Harry said.  "It's meant to be supplies to get _out_ of trouble with, not the other way around."  He tossed another clod.  "What do you think, Draco? If you lower me on the rope, can I get down safely enough to get a rope tied around the professor?"

            Draco pulled himself out from under the rowan and came over to stand over Harry.  By the quirk of the moment, he was a good six inches taller, and Harry was kind of surprised to see that there was nothing gloating in his eyes at the sudden advantage.  "You could," Draco said.  "But you're not going to."

            "What do you mean?  Even if we lowered a rope, I don't think he's in any condition to hang onto it," Harry hissed, not wanting Snape to hear.  "I'm lighter than you are."

            "_Now_ you are," Draco said intensely.  "But that's not going to last, is it?  We keep changing.  But what isn't changing is the way my arm hurts.  It might be all right for tying a rope around Professor Snape, but I'm not going to be able to pull much with it."

            "So what are we going to do?  Try to lasso him?"

            "_You're_ going to lower _me_ over the edge," Draco said, looking suddenly much younger.  For a moment the two boys were eye to eye.  "And then you're going to bring me back up.  Aren't you?"

            Harry looked down into the pale eyes and saw real fear in them.  Draco really needed the question answered, and as he resembled more and more the frightened first year that had done detention in the forest with Harry, Harry found that he wanted less and less to somehow prove himself superior.  It wasn't bravery to do something you weren't afraid of; it was bravery to go ahead and do what terrified you.  He wanted to ask Draco which frightened him more – going over the edge or trusting Harry on the rope – but it didn't matter.  Not really.

            "If you hadn't wanted Slytherin," Harry said.  "I think you could have been in Gryffindor."

Draco blinked.  Blinked again and almost smiled.  "I suppose you think that's a compliment," he said.

            "Desperate rescues customarily are enacted with expediency, Snape's voice prompted from the darkness.  

            The boys grinned at each other.  "I'll pull you up, Draco," Harry said, and went to get the rope.


	13. Cliffhanger

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: Only the plot is mine, everything else is JK Rowling's.

            Chapter 13: Cliffhanger

            Summary: Harry and Draco work together to get Snape out of danger.

            ************

            Lowering Draco with the rope proved to be more complicated than it sounded.  There was only one length of rope in the pack, for one thing, and they had to work out a way of tying Draco to one end that wouldn't go too loose when he was smaller or too tight when he grew.  It was Draco who suggested two loops, that he could put his legs through.  "We can do the same thing with the other end of the rope for Professor Snape."

            "That's an idea."  Harry agreed.  "It doesn't leave a lot of rope for pulling you back up with, though."

            "Maybe not, but once I've got the rope around the Professor, you can tie it to something, and then McGonagall can help you pull me up and we'll all three pull him up."

            "Loop the rope around a tree," Professor McGonagall suggested.  "That will make it easier to control than if you've just hung it down straight."

            "Which tree?" Harry wondered, seeing the sense of the suggestion.  

            "The hawthorn on the other side of the oak," McGonagall said.  "That would be the most appropriate."

            Harry couldn't even tell how she knew it was there from where she was lying, but she was right, there was a hawthorn, not five inches from the edge, and about four feet from the oak tree.  He worked his way carefully under the lowest thorny branch and threaded the rope around the trunk once and once more, completely encircling it.  Then he tested the rope, working it back and forth to make sure that it wouldn't catch on the bark, before backing back out to Draco.

            "This end's ready," Draco had the loops set.  "Give me that end."

            "Here."  Harry paced the clearing, testing possible places to brace his feet or tie off the rope while he waited for Draco to get the ends ready.  A couple of the things he thought were roots came free of the mud at the first tug, but he found a few sturdier possibilities.  At least it wasn't raining very much anymore.   Maybe it couldn't rain, so close to the barrier.  Harry looked up, wishing he could figure out whether or not it was worth wasting a firework to signal for more help.  He just couldn't tell.  By the way the tree branches were cut off, it might only go up and be destroyed, and he only had two of them left.

            "Severus, you're very quiet," McGonagall said, and Harry looked back to where she was holding on.

            "Just…"  Snape's voice was hoarse, and he coughed to clear his throat.  "Just resting, Minerva," he said tiredly.  "I haven't bled to death yet."

            Harry and Draco looked at each other.  There wasn't going to be time to wait for help to get here anyway, Harry decided, as Draco held up the other end of the rope, ready to go.  "Just hang on, sir," Harry called to Snape.  "And keep your eyes closed in case Malfoy knocks anything loose on the way down."

            Draco stepped into the first harness, one leg in each loop, and held the rope with his injured arm as he made his careful way over McGonagall's head.  "When I get a good place to hold on," he told Harry, "you tie off the rope, and then let down the other end so I can get Professor Snape hooked into it.  Then you make _his_ rope fast.  Right?"

            "I've got it," Harry said testily, and then regretted it when he saw how pale Draco had gone, now that it was time to make the climb down.  He twisted his arm into the rope for a  better grip,  and nodded in a way that he hoped was reassuring as he braced his feet.  "Good luck, Draco."

            He realized his mistake the moment that Draco had to really put his weight on the rope.  Harry just couldn't depend on his arm strength staying consistent while he tried to support Draco – and the rope burned in his hands as he tried to hold it.  "Wait!"

            "Ouch!" Draco shouted from where he'd disappeared over the edge.  "Don't drop me, Potter!"

            "Sorry!" Harry called.  "Can you hang on for a minute?"

            "I'm not low enough yet," Draco protested.

            "Just for a minute.  I need to get a better grip."  

            "Hurry up then.  It's all thorns down here."

            "That's _holly_, Lucius," Snape said, his voice younger again.  "Honestly, don't you _ever_ pay attention in Herbology?"

            Harry made a hasty overhand knot in the rope, leaving the bight big enough to slip over his head and down around his chest, so that he was bracing his entire weight on the line across his back.  "I'm ready now.  How much more rope do you need?"

            "About three feet.  I think I can brace myself there."  Draco called.

            "All right. I'm going to have to do it pretty carefully," Harry grunted.  "Try not to let go with both hands."  Carefully, moving inch by inch along the footholds among the roots, Harry worked his way toward hawthorn tree, watching as the rope came back round the oak and over the elbow of one of the roots over McGonagall before vanishing down into the darkness.  He could hear Draco talking to Snape.

            "Of course I pay attention in Herbology, but it's easier when there's a little light.  How did you get so tangled up in it?"

            "I'm not sure.  It sort of tangled itself.  Have you come to get me out of here?"

            "Yes," Draco said. "There."  The rope stopped pulling on Harry.  "All right, Potter!  Make sure you tie it tight."

            "Potter's up there?  What if he's got Black and Lupin with him?" Snape's voice cracked.

            "It's all right," Draco told him as Harry worked a knot around a tree root to support Draco and began to coil up the rest of the rope to take with him as he got into position to pass it down.  "McGonagall's up there.  I mean, Professor McGonagall.  Sir.  Come on… please, remember.  You're the Potions Master, now."

            "It's all right, Mr. Malfoy," McGonagall said, as Harry carefully stepped over her once more.  "There seems to be a memory barrier whenever he drops to the ages around the time of school leaving, but it doesn't seem to be permanent."

            "Potions Master?" Snape echoed, his voice dropping half an octave.  "As if I'd ever be a teacher at _this_ school.  Imagine having to look at old McGonagall's hatchet face in the faculty lounge every morning."

            "Severus!" McGonagall exclaimed indignantly.  

            Harry had to get a better grip to keep himself from slipping and stepping on her, and he swallowed a laugh. He reached the edge of the tree and looked down to the two Slytherins, who, safely out of McGonagall's range of vision, were grinning at each other.  Snape looked to be about seventeen or so, and going upwards, Draco slipping down towards eleven again.  "Hey, Draco.  Ready for the rope?"

            "I think so," Draco said, shifting his grip on the root he was holding onto, so that he'd hooked his elbow through with one arm, and could get both hands a little freer.

They both composed their faces quickly, and Snape frowned upwards at Harry.  "Potter?" he asked, and then, as he passed some invisible boundary in time, repeated, "Potter," more certainly before calling, "Minerva?"

"I'm still here, Severus," McGonagall said tartly.  "Hatchet face and all."

"What are you on about?" Snape asked wonderingly.  Harry ignored them both and threaded the rope downwards to Draco while McGonagall relieved her feelings by reciting a rather thorough description of the past few minutes' conversation.

"You'll have to forgive me, Minerva," Snape said drily as Draco worked one of the loops around his left boot.  "as an insult it really wasn't up to my usual standard."  He made a pained noise then, and used a word that Harry only vaguely knew the meaning of.  "Careful, Mr. Malfoy," he told Draco, "that leg's not exactly unhurt, you know."

"I can tell," Draco said.  "Let me get the other foot through this loop, and then we'll see about padding it a little."  He looked up at Harry.  "I'm not sure we're going to be able to just pull him up," he said.  "He's all tangled into things;  you might need me to work him loose as you pull."

"I'm not sure…" Harry started.

"You and McGonagall together," Draco said, cutting him off.  "I'll tell you when he's gone youngest again, and you can pull him up when he's at his lightest point.  I'll climb up along behind and help him.  As long as the rope's tied, it's not like I can fall any farther, right?"  

"I don't think so," Harry said.  He didn't like the plan much, but he couldn't think of a better one.  "All right.  I'll go back and get the rope tied off so that Professor McGonagall can let go of the cloak, then."

"Right."  Draco concentrated on getting Snape into the rest of the harness.

Harry made sure that the rope would go over another root, and not hit McGonagall as he measured it out to the farthest tying off place he could reach.  He turned to check the tautness and the rope looked sturdy enough.  When he called for Draco to check, the other boy said that the rope seemed to be holding Snape all right.  Harry went over to  McGonagall.  "You can let go now, Ma'am."

"Do you know," she said carefully, "I don't think I can, actually."

_Oh_.  Harry knelt and looked at her hands, clenched tightly around the gathered cloth.  They looked cold – nearly blue, where they weren't white with effort.  "Uhm…  this might hurt," he said, and carefully began working the cloth out of her grip.  Her hands _were_ cold, terribly cold, and he tried blowing warmth at them as he worked, and letting his own hands warm them now and then, to loosen up the crabbed shapes from the wool.

Over the edge of the world he heard Draco saying, "Do you see colors in it?" quietly.

"It doesn't do to look long at the abyss, Mr. Malfoy," Snape replied.  "You soon get a surfeit of it."

At last Harry got McGonagall's hands free of the cloth and she pulled them into her chest as she curled onto her side, biting her lip to keep from making a noise about the returning circulation. Her age slid younger than Harry had seen it go all this time, down into her forties or even thirties.  She looked very different and much the same in the shadows below the lantern; soft-faced and vulnerable with eyes that spoke of steel, and he hastily made himself busy with disentangling the ivy that had caught at her legs.  "There," he said, and caught her elbow to help her upright.  "There, how do you feel?"

            "Not entirely well, Mr. Potter," she answered.  "But I think… I think we should get the other two up here, quickly."

            "Yes."  Harry helped her take her place in the bight, so she could use her weight to pull with and not her tormented hands.  He dug through the pack for some cloth to use on his hands as makeshift gloves.

            "We're almost ready, Draco," he called. "Tell us when."

            "Now, sir," Draco responded, speaking to Snape.  "See if you can remember.  What did the Sorting Hat sing the year you first came to Hogwarts?"

            _And I'll concentrate on being as old as I can,_ Harry thought to himself, trying to think his muscles as big as they'd go.  He wasn't expecting a lot of help from McGonagall, really – not in the shape she was – and as the voice of Snape trying to recite the song grew younger he dug in his heels and started to pull.

            An inch, two inches, six, eight…  He had to find another place to brace his right foot, and then all of a sudden he felt McGonagall's help kick in and was astonished at the strength of the steady pull.  A small pale face appeared over the tangle of roots and then the oversized coat of chainmail along with it.  Harry kept pulling, since Snape kept coming, not stopping until he'd gotten the boy onto the muddy leaves and he could see Draco climbing up behind him.

            As soon as the rope stopped pulling at him, Snape twisted up onto his knees and stared wearily at Harry, and beyond to McGonagall.  He was already beginning to age upwards, his face filling in and changing, although his hair always seemed to be the same.  As Harry watched the boy became the man, lengthening and starting to fill out.  Lines started to appear gradually on his face, and then suddenly he pulled his left arm to his chest as every line that Harry knew filled in the outlines, as if he'd aged twenty years in a single night, once not so long ago.

Snape blinked once, looking nearly as startled as Harry felt.  He was looking past Harry, and Harry turned to follow the gaze.

            There was…someone…or the shape of someone… just blending into the shadows of the forest where the rope had been pulled, well behind the place where McGonagall still stood looking confused in the circle of the loop of rope where Harry'd put her.

            "Remus?" Snape asked.  And then fainted.


	14. First Aid

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: This is still JKRs, but I'm getting awfully fond of it…

            Chapter 14:  First Aid

            Summary: Having gotten Snape and McGonagall rescued from the edge of the world, Harry and Draco have to get the battered teachers back to Hogwarts.

            *********

            "Professor!"

            "Severus!"

            When Snape fell face forward into the mud, McGonagall leaped forward to check on him.  Harry left her to it, and quickly switched his place on the rope so that he could pull Draco the last of the way up onto solid ground.  Draco looked as worried as Harry felt.  He extracted himself quickly from the rope harness as Harry collected the pack and went over to him.  

            "Did you see anyone?" Harry asked him, checking over his own shoulder for more shapes in the shadows.

            "I was watching the Professor," Draco admitted, rubbing at his sore arm nervously.  "And then when he said that about Lupin I looked over and I thought I _might_ have seen… someone… or something… but…" he bit his lip.  "Who would help and then go away?  Do you think it was Professor Lupin?"

            "Or _another_ werewolf," Harry guessed.  "I didn't get a good look either."  He had a horrible feeling of being watched, and he didn't much like it.  He handed the pack to Draco.  "Here. There's some first aid stuff in this.  You help the teachers, and I'll get the lantern."

            "Do you want to use the rope?" Draco said, taking the pack and holding up the rope he'd just gotten free of.  "I don't want to have to go over the side again if you slip."

            "Thanks," Harry said, emphatically.  He meant to be very careful indeed, but he was grateful to have the rope to hang onto for extra security.  The roots were slippery, and the wind was starting to pick up.

            By the time he got the lantern down, Draco and McGonagall had managed to get Snape off of the tree roots, using his battered cloak to drag him over to a slightly softer patch of mud, with his head in McGonagall's lap.  She had wrapped a corner of her own cloak around one stiff hand and was awkwardly cleaning the mud off the unconscious man's face.  As Harry tried to find a good place to put the light so that they could see what they were doing, he heard her say softly, "Oh, Severus, trust you to be difficult and obstructive!"

The light showed up Snape's bruises.  It also showed the black chainmail coat that Snape was wearing.  It was shaped much like the coat he usually wore under his cloak, except for that it didn't have the buttons down the front, only a slit partway up from the bottom, front and back, as if he were going to have to sit a horse or a broom.  It came down to his knees, like a frock coat, the fine meshed rings of metal glinting silver where they'd been knocked clean of patina by a blow.  Harry thought it a pity that the armor didn't extend farther down.  If Snape had been wearing armor trousers too, he might not have been as badly hurt.

Draco was carefully cutting open one of Snape's trouser legs with a folding knife and look of determined disgust.  The black wool didn't show the blood well, but Draco's pale hands did, and when he finally managed to get the seam split up to Snape's knee, the light showed up a cut along his calf that was deep enough to make both boys have to turn away for a moment.

            "Euwwch." It wasn't right, being able to see the _inside_ of someone's leg like a piece of meat in a butcher shop.  Harry was glad he hadn't had a chance to eat anything, and poor Draco looked absolutely green.  "Professor McGonagall, how do we deal with _that_?"

            She checked the damage, worried, but not unsurprised.  "Wrap it well until we can get far enough away from here to use magic reliably," she said.  "The pressure should slow down the bleeding."

            "I'm surprised he's got anything left to bleed with," Draco said, starting to reach for the pack, and then hesitating at the sight of his own gory hands.  "Hand me something clean to put against the cut, will you, Potter?  I don't want to make a mess of things."

            "Okay."  Harry wiped his own hands as clean as he could on the inside of his cloak, and dug into the pack, finding the small roll of gauze and bandages near the bottom.  It didn't look to him as if it would be enough to pad the wound _and_ wrap it, but there wasn't any more.

            Draco scowled when he heard the news.  "We'll need to wrap the leg, to keep the clean stuff against the wound.  Not that I know how we'll manage that with him changing size all the time.  Isn't there anything else in there?  Cloth we can cut into strips?  Anything?"

            "Nothing," Harry told him.

            "Look again!" Draco ordered angrily, his voice going higher.

            "I did.  I'm not hiding anything, Malfoy!"  Harry said, stung by the implied criticism.

            "Stupid Gryffindors!" Draco said, trying to make the pad of clean stuff stretch over the length of the wound.  "If I make an emergency kit, it's going to have enough bandages in it for a proper emergency!"

            "That's enough, you!" said a very young girl's voice, sharply.  Both boys' heads swung up, startled, to find McGonagall glaring at them with frightened eyes – she looked like a child dressed in her mother's armor, and not any older than nine.  She bit her lip a little uncertainly, but then took a breath and went on, a little unsteadily, "Insults aren't going to get us out of here – wherever it is.  Gryffindors aren't stupid.  Being brave doesn't mean you have to be impractical," she told Draco.  "And being practical doesn't mean you aren't brave," she told Harry.  

"You can make bandages out of your cloaks or scarves, or cut off his other trouser leg, all the way round at the knee to make a tube, and then pull it up over the hurt leg to hold the rest where it is," She went on determinedly.  "Just pin it, or tie it, to keep it in place."  It was hard not to keep staring at her, for as she spoke, she aged upwards, blossoming from a gawky, plain adolescence into a kind of brilliant beauty that made the regal bone structure of her face into something out of a fairytale.  "It might be even simpler just to cut off the toe of a stocking, and use that," she decided.  And then she blinked, and shook her head, still young enough to be intimidating and beautiful, but too old for school, and said.  "What an odd sensation!"

            "Are you all right, Professor?" Harry asked, carefully not looking at her as he started tearing from the lining of his own cloak.  That sounded a lot more practical than cutting off a trouser leg or getting a sock.  Dryer, anyway.  Draco was still holding the bandages in place on Snape's wound and goggling at McGonagall, looking very uncomfortable.

            "I went younger than eighteen, didn't I?" she said, still licking her lips as if she'd tasted something odd.  "How young?"

            "Uhm.." Draco's voice cracked, and he blushed as he tried again.  "I think nine. Or maybe ten.

            "Too young for a first year, anyway," Harry agreed.  He held up the cloth he'd collected to distract Draco.  "Here.  Let's try wrapping his leg with this."

            "Right," Draco said, becoming quickly more helpful.

            Professor McGonagall was lost in thought.  "I don't think Severus ever went younger than eleven," she said.  "So if the limitation _hasn't_ something to do with being a first year student…" she frowned, thinking.

            Harry and Draco worked together, glancing over now and then.  It took a much longer time for McGonagall to reach her proper age than it had for Snape to do it, and the flow of lines and wrinkles and gray hair never seemed to change her completely the way they had with him.  But now, both boys could see that her beauty was a constant– it changed in quality, but it never vanished.  Harry wondered that he had ever thought of her as being anything but beautiful before this.  Draco seemed to be affected the same way.  As they pulled Snape's trouser leg down and tucked into his stocking to keep the crude bandaging as secure as they could manage, he whispered to Harry, "Do you suppose any of the girls in our year are going to change like _that_?"

            It didn't surprise Harry that Draco could be thinking about girls; _anything_ was better to think about than the feel and smell of the blood that they couldn't avoid getting on their hands as they'd bandaged Snape.  "I hate to break it to you, Draco," he said, "but I think some of them have already started."

            "I meant now… when we get back to the castle," Draco said, wiping his hands on some leaves and getting stiffly to his feet.

            Harry looked around at the wind-rattled trees at the edge of the light, and the black swirling of what Snape had called the abyss.  The not-colors made his eyes and stomach hurt.  "I don't think so," he said, suddenly wanting very much to be back safely in the Great Hall.  "But I think we'd better get a start on trying to find out."  He went over to the muddy broom, still lying where he had left it and reached out his hand with a sense of misgiving.  "Up," he coaxed.  To his surprise, the broom floated up to his hand – not with the eagerness that a broom usually did, but at least it still seemed to work.  

            They had to rouse Professor Snape in order to get him upright enough to sit on the broom.  The Potions professor had shifted age only a little while he was unconscious, but the moment his eyes opened he slid suddenly toward childhood again, and they were left with a small white-faced boy, biting his lip to keep himself from whimpering with pain.  Draco swore and hastily checked the wrappings on the injured leg.

            "It's all right, Mr. Snape," Professor McGonagall said.  "We've got to get you onto this broom, so we can fly you back to the hospital wing.  Do you think you can balance?"

            "Yes, Professor," Snape said shakily, looking from Draco to Harry with confusion in his eyes.  "If I have to."

            "Double up," Harry said gruffly.  "You ride with him, Draco."

            "I don't think the broom will hold two," Draco said.  "Not 'til we're closer to the school anyway." He shifted to get a good grip on Snape while the teacher was so much smaller.  "Potter, hold the broom steady while I get him on."

            "Right."  Harry held it carefully at a height of three feet, while Draco lifted the injured boy into position, grimacing at the strain it put on his bad arm

"Do you want me to do that?" Harry asked, when Draco stumbled.  "That armor's got to be heavy."

Snape tightened his hold a little on Draco's neck, and the blond boy shook his head. "It's not as heavy as it looks," he said.  "Just … I'll hold still, and you move the broom here, okay?"

"I suppose you think this is funny, Potter," Snape growled, glaring at Harry suspiciously, as he maneuvered the broom into place. "It's probably all your fault."

"Not this time," Harry said, trying to be patient, since Snape obviously didn't remember things when he was too young.  It was kind of funny, really, being told off by a soprano Snape, but Harry was too worried to enjoy it just now.  "Come on," he said persuasively, "let go of Draco. I'm not going to let the broom drop you."

"You'd best not," Snape said.

"It's all right," Draco said, shaking his arms out before giving Snape a reassuring pat on the shoulder.  "Nobody's going to do anything rash when we've got a Professor watching, right?"

"Certainly not," McGonagall said.  She was still sitting on the ground, and Harry left the broom and Snape to Draco to go over and help her.  "I trust you have a plan, Mr. Malfoy?"

            "We'll just keep the broom about this high and walk alongside it. I can take care of Professor Snape and Potter can help you over the rough bits.  It might take a while, but once we're closer to the castle maybe we can use magic again."

            "Professor Snape?" Snape asked looking around.  "Is Uncle Silas here?"

            "We'll explain later," McGonagall said, hooking her arm through the straps of the pack to lift it up to Harry as he helped her to her feet. "Fetch his cloak, Mr. Potter.  It's wet, but it's probably warmer than that mail."

            Harry settled the pack onto his back and then bent to get the length of wool that had saved Snape's life and disentangle it from the bits of ivy and holly that clung to it.  Behind him he heard Draco say, "Professor, if there was no magic over the edge of the… edge, then why didn't Professor Snape's chainmail turn back into his regular clothes?"          

            "You should be able to work out the answer to that, Mr. Malfoy," McGonagall said, drily.  "Mr. Snape, please tell me about the antidotes to…"

            "Excuse me, Professor," Malfoy interrupted politely, "but I think he'll be easier to keep on the broom if he's younger."

            "True.  Very well, then, Mr. Snape, please explain the process by which you Transfigure a matchstick into a needle."

            Snape sighed as Harry wrapped the cloak around him.  "Yes, Professor," he said, and then started to describe the process she'd asked for as Harry retrieved the lantern so that they could all start up the hill.

            The rain, which had been very light down in the hollow, got heavier when they got farther away from the edge, and the ground was covered in debris along the path of the balrog's advance, so they couldn't go very fast.  They had to rely on the lantern, because the lightning had diminished to a flash every few minutes, and Harry had a lot of trouble keeping the sputtering lantern from going out completely, since one side of it was open to the wind.  He had to use his other hand to support McGonagall, since she couldn't hold onto him very well.  He had to put the lantern down entirely, once or twice, to help her over rough bits, and very nearly carried her entirely across the streambed.  Fortunately, her armor didn't have a proper weight either.  Harry shook the rain out of his hair and wiped his glasses before getting the lantern and helping McGonagall catch up to Draco and Snape.  He wondered what the armor was made of.  Magic aluminium, perhaps?

            Draco wasn't having an easy time of it either.  In spite of everything, Snape began to put on some inches and his voice went deeper.  They had to stop and wait for him to orient himself once he passed the odd "leaving school" place in his growth, and then Draco had to adjust the bandage again because it was too tight.  Snape almost fainted, and when Harry hastily tried to help Draco keep Snape from falling off the broom he dropped the lantern and it broke.

            "Blast it, Potter, I'm all right!" Snape protested, as he tried to regain his balance.  "Get the light."

            "I will in a minute," Harry said, waiting for Snape to get his balance on the broom  before he let go of the injured man.  He pulled out his wand, hoping they'd walked far enough.  "Lumos!"

            The wand flashed bright, much brighter than Harry had expected it to, but only for a second before it went dark again.  Harry blinked, seeing purple spots from the glare.  

            "Hey!" Draco said.  "Warn us next time, Potter."

            "I don't think wand magic will be reliable just yet, Mr. Potter," McGonagall said.  

            "A potion might," Snape said, fumbling along the nearly empty pockets of the bandolier he still wore.  "Here."  He handed a phial to Harry.  "Try that on something you don't mind catching fire."

            "Thank you, Professor," Harry felt around for a stick, and then poured a few drops of the potion onto one end.  The stick burst into flames, despite how soggy it had been to begin with, and Harry used it to find a bigger stick for a better torch.  

            In the renewed light, Harry saw that Draco was looking off towards the castle.  "What is it?" he asked.

            "I thought I saw some lights, before you lit that," Draco said.  "Will o' the wisps, probably."

            "Listen," Harry suggested, looking the way that Draco had pointed, and immediately he heard voices.

**            "Careful!"**

**            "There's another patch of it."**

**            "Look out then."**

**            "We should be getting close."**

            "What are you listening to, Mr. Malfoy?" Professor McGonagall asked.  "And how?"

            "It's the Hear-Muffs," Harry said.  "If you concentrate, you can hear people from a long way off."

            "And we're hearing people," Draco said happily. "It's a rescue party, I bet.  Let them know where we are, Potter."

            Harry gave the torch to Draco and dug into the pack for the last of the fireworks.  It skittered upwards brightly, bursting green and red well above the trees.  Then he took the torch back again, waving it back and forth.

            It wasn't a minute before he saw half a dozen riders on brooms coming up the burn.  They were cloaked and hooded against the rain, but several of them carried lanterns, and they flew like experts.  Another minute and they were swarming around the tired foursome, touching down lightly.

            "Sorry we took so long," said the first to arrive cheerfully, pushing his hood back off of his face.

            It was Cedric Diggory.


	15. Unexpected Help

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: Can't imagine why you'd think this was mine.  Don't you read the papers?

            Chapter 15: Unexpected Help

            Summary: A rescue party comes from the castle to help Harry, Draco, Snape and McGonagall back.

            ************

            Cedric, seemingly unaware that he was the cause of the weary quartet's silence, went on speaking as the rest of the rescue party landed in a semicircle behind him.  "Fritz said you'd be using foxfire for markers, but I don't think he figured on how dim foxfire is on a rainy night.  Good thing you sent up that firework or we'd never have found you."

            "Not before time, Mr. Diggory," Snape rasped.  Like Harry and McGonagall, he'd shot up to his full age, but he, at least, was still able to speak directly to the Hufflepuff Seeker. Snape was pale as parchment, but his expression was as fierce as ever, and he straightened defiantly on the broom.

            Harry just stared at the apparition before him and stumbled backwards into McGonagall, feeling like he'd been hit in the belly with a bludger.  McGonagall wrapped an arm around him, and he could feel her trembling behind him as she too stared at the revenant Hufflepuff.  "Easy, Mr. Potter," she said in his ear.  "We've been knocked free of our proper time, remember?  Diggory is just… from earlier." Her voice shook, low as it was.  Harry reached up to cover her arm with his free hand, grateful to her for trying to make sense out of what could never be right.

Draco was chalk white, years falling off him steadily.  He started to back away down the slippery hillside, despite Snape's grip on his shoulder, and the injured Professor swayed, trying to stay balanced as he was dragged along.  Cedric stepped forward, probably intending to help, and Draco squeaked and fled, taking Snape and the broom along with him.  Harry swore.  If it weren't for McGonagall he might have wanted to run from Cedric himself, but Draco had just panicked.  He wasn't paying attention to Snape, and Snape was still hanging on to his student's cloak, shouting in a harrowed, gruff voice, "_Mr. Malfoy, the castle is **that** way_…" as he began to tip sideways…  Boy and teacher crashed to the ground as the broom slipped free and sped off into the darkness.  

"Accio broom!" Cedric cried quickly, pulling out his wand.  Harry thought he saw the broom falter and fall, but it didn't return.  

Harry started toward the two who had fallen, bringing the torch for light toward the fallen pair.  McGonagall still held onto him, so he had to go more slowly than Draco had over the wet, debris-strewn ground.  Behind him, Harry could hear some of the other students making comments in alarmed soprano voices.  When he checked over his shoulder, Cedric was coming along behind him with a lantern, but the rest were hanging back, their cloaks puddling around their feet and their eyes huge in young faces.  

McGonagall slipped, and Harry dropped the torch as he kept her from falling.  It didn't quite go out, in spite of the sogginess of the ground.  Once Harry was sure that McGonagall's footing was firm again, he bent to retrieve it, and the flame quickly circled the wood again, doubling the light as Cedric caught up with the lantern.  They still had twenty yards to go to catch up to Draco and Snape.

Then things happened very fast.  Snape pushed himself upright and then made a strange, high, cut-off noise when Draco, trying to disentangle himself, accidentally kicked the bandaged leg.

A shadowy figure dropped from a low limb and loomed over Snape and Draco.  Harry took a tighter grip on the torch, visions of werewolves in his head.   Snape twisted around, fumbling for his wand and glaring at the figure as he tried to push Draco behind him.  

Harry advanced with Cedric, waving the torch in hopes of scaring off the new arrival. The flickering torchlight turned the strange hump of the silhouette into a battered black cloak, and then the figure threw back its hood back with a snap of its head.

Snape's wand wavered, just a little, before he tucked it away. "Lupin," he growled.  "I warned you once about dropping out of trees behind me."

It _was_ Professor Lupin, looking exhausted and soaked.  "Sorry," he said, crouching down and showing both hands empty. "Pax." 

Snape stared at him, and then took the hand, as if to pull himself upright. Lupin tugged him upwards, putting Snape's arm over his own shoulders so Snape could hang on as he gathered him up and lifted.  Snape looked startled, but submitted, and his other hand pulled Draco upright by the cloak as Lupin straightened.

Lupin looked from Harry to Cedric.  "Here," Lupin said, trying to hold out his burden to Cedric, still the taller of the two.  "You'd best get him back to the castle."

McGonagall had come up behind more slowly.  She nudged Harry's shoulder.  "Take Malfoy," she told him.  "Remus can manage to carry Severus."  Harry did as he was bid, trying not to shy away from Cedric too obviously, since the older boy plainly had no clue of what it was about himself  that was so unnerving.  

Snape tightened his grip determinedly on his sometime colleague.  "You'd best come too," he commanded.

"I can't go with you," Lupin shook his head, clearly unhappy.  "It's not safe.  I can't tell if the moon…  I can't even _feel_ the moon.  It's not _safe_."

"There _is_ no moon," Snape told him, "Some of the usual constants are absent here,"  He glanced down at his left arm, and then scowled when he noticed the boys were watching him.

Lupin turned to McGonagall then, still shaking his head in denial.  "I keep… blacking out.  Forgetting things," he said, as if it were an explanation.

"You keep dropping and rising in age," Snape told him sharply.  "It's happening to all of us.  Look at Malfoy and Potter."

Harry'd gotten a grip on Draco's arm by now, and he knew what Snape meant.  He was as old as he'd ever been in his life, but Draco still looked like he'd gotten fresh off his first trip on the Hogwarts express. "It's alright, Professor Lupin," Harry said, trying to be reassuring.  "You just can't remember what happens when you get too young, I think.  Professor Snape can't."

"Nor I," added McGonagall.  "Come with us, Remus.  We won't leave you out here alone."

"Go along with Potter, Mr. Malfoy," Snape said, still looking down at Draco, who had gotten a grip of his Housemaster's cloak.  "There's nothing here to worry you."

"Yes, sir."  Draco said, letting go reluctantly.

"Good," Snape said.  "I'd like to get back to the castle before I bleed to death, then," he said, and closed his eyes.

"Stretcher," Diggory commanded and the other students who'd come with him began to unfurl the stretchers they were carrying.  

While Lupin and Diggory got Snape settled onto one of the stretchers, and McGonagall too, Harry checked Draco for damage from his fall.  "It's all right," he told him, wondering if Draco were going to go even younger than eleven.  "You're not afraid of ghosts."

"Of course not," Draco sneered automatically, still staring at Cedric.  He bit his lip, and looked at Harry.  "But he's not a ghost, is he?  He's not supposed to be here – and I _can't_ remember why."

"I can," Harry said grimly.  He hadn't been able to until Cedric came, though, and that was almost worse.  When had everything outside of Hogwarts gotten so hard to concentrate on?  Maybe that's why Draco had gone so young, so that he _couldn't_ remember.  "Can you remember the balrog?"

Draco nodded.  "Sort of," he said.  "But… it's starting to feel like a story.  Like it happened to someone else."

"What's the first thing you do remember clearly, then?"

Draco scowled.  "Wanting someone older to take over with the Quidditch team, so that they'd pay attention."

"Flint!" Harry exclaimed, remembering that first conversation with Draco in the Great Hall quite well. "That's why it felt wrong.  He's already left school!"

Draco grew three inches.  "Do you mean people can show up, even if they're not supposed to be at Hogwarts?   People from the past?"

"I think so," Harry said, a little frightened by the idea, now that it had been put into words.  

            "_Dead_ people?" Draco said, although it wasn't really a question.

            "They wouldn't be dead yet, would they?" Harry said.  "Not if they're coming from the past."

            "I guess not."  Draco straightened up.  "At least _he_ doesn't think he's dead.  And there are bound to be Living people too, if Flint wasn't meant to be here.  That's not so bad."  He turned to look up towards Snape and muttered, "Just as long as we don't run into Father."

            "Here, Harry, you'll need this," someone said, putting a broom into Harry's hand.  He jumped, and was astonished to discover that it was Cho Chang, and was astonished again because he hadn't noticed her when the rescue party had arrived.  _There's too much to think about,_ he realized.  _Snape and McGonagall at the edge of the world, Diggory here, and maybe other people…  _  He was grateful for the chance to mount the broom, Draco behind him and just fly for a while.

            They got above the trees, where they could see the flaming outline of Gryffindor tower and fly straight, taking turns switching off with the stretchers, since no one quite trusted the spell that was meant to make the stretchers float in the increasingly strong wind.  The size of the rescue party seemed to change too, although there were never fewer than four flyers with each stretcher. Draco and Harry ended up staying with Snape's stretcher, since Draco could do the lifting while Harry flew the broom.  Lupin had somehow gotten a broom of his own, and he stayed with McGonagall.

            It took concentrating to just fly; to not look as leaves and even branches got pulled off the trees and splattered above them into black nonexistence against an undefined barrier in the sky.  Harry had to keep steering to the left just to go in a straight line, and he was grateful to the Weasley twins for lighting the windows of the tower as well as the beacon on the roof, because it meant he didn't have to keep his head as high.  Without conference, the rescue party dropped to just above the grass as soon as they were clear of the trees.  It reminded Harry of flying through the fog before; the light didn't illuminate much more of an area than he'd been able too see in the mist.  Except then he'd been on a much better broom.  He could feel odd skips, each one longer than the one before.  He checked on the flyer in front of him and realized that she was having trouble too.  

Harry's feet brushed the grass moments after they'd passed over the main gate.  "We have to stop!" he called.  "Stop, everyone!"  Two of the others had reached the same conclusion, and called out too, and the party quickly landed.  Cho tried getting her broom to fly again, but it was no use.

            Draco drew his wand and tried a Levitation charm on Snape's stretcher.  It didn't work.  "I'm getting very tired of magic not working!" he growled.

            "Muscles still work," Harry said, not much looking forward to carrying two teachers up all those steps.  Maybe they could talk them into being children again.

            "Mine are _tired_, thank you," Draco said, rubbing at his arm.

            "But they work," said Lupin.  His age was slipping downwards, but he was still older than anyone else in the group – anyone standing, anyway.  "Alternate young and old, half to each stretcher.  We're almost there."

            McGonagall tried to sit up.  "I don't need to be carried," she pointed out, but she was very pale.

"Potions," Snape said hoarsely.  He blinked up at them, and Harry wondered if the man had spent some of the trip in a faint.  "Potions work."

"Yes, but you can't be carried with a potion, Professor," Draco said, getting out a handkerchief to wipe some of the rain and wet leaves off the injured man's face and hands.

"Bring me Filch, and I won't need to be," Snape growled.


	16. Fetching Filch

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer:  Not mine.  JKRs. 

            Chapter 16: Fetching Filch

            Summary: Filch has a few surprises up his sleeve after Harry finally gets back to the Great Hall.

            A/N: Thanks here to Ozma (You MUST go and Read the "Squib" series!) for what I've done with Filch, and ~v~Jinx~v~ for lending me Professors Woodwalker and Keele.

            ************

            "What's Filch got to do with anything?" Draco asked.

            Snape shook his head.  "Too much to explain.  Get him.  You or Potter."

            "Why not one of the others?" Draco settled himself, as if to make his position more permanent.

            "Where's Diggory, then?" Snape closed his eyes, grimacing.

            Harry, startled, looked at the others in the group.  Cedric wasn't among them.  Cho was still there, and so was Oliver Wood, who he didn't remember seeing before among the rescuers.  His stomach fell to his boots.  "But….But…  We can't have lost him.  Not again."

            McGonagall had managed to sit up with Lupin's help, and was looking over the group just as confusedly as Harry was.  "Possibly," she said after a thoughtful moment.  "Possibly, the people who've left school or… The ones who weren't here when we fell out of our proper time and place don't always… _stay_," she theorized.  "He's not lost, just, not _here_ now."

            Harry saw the problem.  "If we send the wrong messengers, they might not arrive.  The message would never get there."  He put his hand up by his face to shield it from the eye-watering wind as he measured the distance left to go.  All those stairs.  "Guess it'll have to be me, then."  

He thought about asking Cho to come with him – he was pretty sure that she was one of the ones who wouldn't disappear – but she was looking around at the others, and he didn't think the tears in her eyes were from the wind.  "Maybe you ought to at least start towards the castle though.  Just in case," he said, directly to the tall Ravenclaw, hoping to distract her.  Cho met his eyes, really looking at him – not just at The Boy Who Lived – and Harry tried to smile reassuringly, even though it didn't feel as if he were doing it very well.  "Maybe he'll come back," he blurted out, feeling his nose suddenly go hot, and the tears driven sideways across his face.

Cho nodded, wiping at her eyes with her fingers.  "Maybe," she said, the struggle to keep the real tears at bay clear on her face. "I've got some things I mean to say to him."  She swallowed. "If I remember."

"You'll remember," Harry assured her.  There were so many things he wanted to say to _her_, all of a sudden, and no time to say them.  How much he liked her wasn't even on the list.  He wanted to tell her how he saw now that she really loved Cedric.  How much Cedric had clearly loved her back.  How Cedric had died. But there was no certainty.  No certainty, even, that Harry would ever get another chance to apologize to her.  And still no time.  Not now.  "I'd better go," he said, his voice cracking, but he couldn't, not until she nodded agreement.  

He patted McGonagall's shoulder.  "I'll be right back.  With Filch," he promised, and started running.

            *** 

            It was when he had to stop and take a breather on the stairs that he first noticed that tremors.  They weren't very large.  On Privet Drive, he might have thought the shaking was due to a particularly large lorry passing by outside, except that it went on too long.  What was it Trelawney had said about an earthquake?  Nothing good, he was pretty sure.  He sat firmly on the desire to panic.  Trelawney wasn't nearly as good at predicting things as she thought she was.

            Although she'd been remarkably good at dodging the balrog.

            His knees felt like they were ready to bend backwards by the time he reached the doors of the Great Hall.  He wanted to rest, but one look at the chaos in the Hall was enough to drive that idea out of his head.

            He'd never seen so many wizards and witches in his life.  Not even at the World Cup Quidditch match.  There were dozens of teachers crowding the dais, moving among the beds, and a whole ring of them blocking the view of Dumbledore, wearing clothes that looked like a museum exhibit of historical costumes.  But mostly the excess people  were youngsters, and most of them were awfully young looking..  He even saw a few infants.  

He checked the ceiling.  Nearly half of it was blank brickwork now, and the silver whirlwind, that had been come-again, go-again before he'd left, was now established much more firmly.  It looked even more like the drainwater whirlwind of a still bath, although it was at least four feet wide at the top.  A long tail extended downwards from the main part of it.  To his surprise, several students were flying their brooms around the tail, tossing small objects into the stream that interrupted its swirling before they vanished.  The students were careful not to get caught in the flow, Harry noticed, and the ghosts who flew near them were even warier

            A small boy in wrinkled pyjamas that Harry vaguely recognized as a Hufflepuff caught him by the elbow.  "What's your name?" he demanded self-importantly.

            "Harry Potter," Harry answered, somewhat breathlessly, and was surprised when the boy turned and repeated the name in a loud voice.  The shout went up the hall, from one first year to another, all of them standing in a long row against one wall, until it came to a boy standing on a chair by the chalkboard, who found Harry's name and put a blue checkmark by it.

            "Harry!" yelled a familiar voice, and Ron barrelled out of the crowd, hands full of sandwiches.  "There you are!  Have you got McGonagall?"

            Harry met him half way, taking the sandwich Ron shoved at him and shaking his head.  "Not quite.  But almost.  Listen, Ron, have you seen Filch anywhere?"

            "They took him to Pomfrey, I think.  Probably still up there."  Ron looked up at Harry, grinning.  "Go on, eat something.  The Fat Friar took charge of the kitchen, so you don't have to worry about it tasting like the stuff Neville and I were making."

            Harry took a bite, gratefully, as he walked up the length of the hall with Ron trailing along.  It was jam and banana, and the sweetness of it almost made him start shaking.  

Ron kept pace, passing over a second sandwich and trying to fill Harry in on everything that had happened in his absence.  "The animals keep showing up, all on their own, but we've had people looking anyway.  All _sorts_ of people.  I mean, Bill and Charlie sent Fred and George down from the tower because Fred kept going all young on them, and Percy got a black eye arguing with another prefect about which one of them was supposed to be Head Boy.  Funny having you taller than me, isn't it?"

            "It's an effect of the time displacement," said Hermione, reaching out to grab Harry's arm from where she sat with a table full of students and a dozen stacks of books.  "I don't think it will last.  Are you feeling all right, Harry?  You've got blood on your clothes."

            "It's not mine," Harry reassured her around a mouthful of egg and cheese sandwich.

            "This is the most fascinating situation," Hermione went on enthusiastically. "We're completely unattached from time, I think.  But it's got the oddest effects.  I've theorized that anyone who's ever come to Hogwarts might show up, except there are limits to how old or young they might go.  I mean, look at the Parvati twins."  Ron and Harry rolled their eyes at each other, grinning at Hermione's relentless elucidation.  "They visited here when they were two, and do you know how much trouble it's been keeping them in nappies?  The first years are most consistent.  I mean, they just stay eleven don't they, within a month or two, but the teachers go all over the place, and the other staff as well, including Hagrid, who was awfully tall even when he was a first year, and then there's the house elves, only they don't seem to change very much except ..."

"Have you seen Filch?" Harry interrupted desperately, having managed to swallow.  "Snape's hurt and he needs him."

            "Severus Snape?  Is he hurt badly?" a young green-eyed girl sitting near Hermione asked, worriedly, and then blinked and frowned when she got a good look at Harry. 

            She looked familiar.  Very familiar.  Harry stared back, trying to remember that even if she was his mum, she wasn't his mum, _yet_.  "Yes.  His leg," he stammered.  "He says he wants Filch."

            "Better hurry, then, boy," the Bloody Baron appeared at Harry's elbow, and shooed him up the hall.  "There's not much more this place can wobble without falling over."

            Harry let himself be carried along, still staring over his shoulder at the green eyed girl.  She really did look like his mum in some of the pictures that Hagrid had put in the album he'd given Harry his first year.  She and Hermione were talking to another girl he didn't recognize until she suddenly went all silver and began to cry.  _Myrtle?_

            "Watch your step, boy," the Baron ordered, his cold hand steering Harry around a cluster of students who were trying to sort out baskets of laundry into different sizes.  "Why did the Head of Slytherin send you after the Caretaker, and on foot?  You left on a broom."

"The brooms stopped working," he found himself explaining to the Slytherin ghost.   "It's all strange outside."

            "Better get one that does work, then," the Baron advised, and turned toward the ceiling, calling out in a voice that Harry couldn't hear, even with the Hear-Muffs.

            One of the flyers, a slim, blond teen in Slytherin robes, bent his broom down at the Baron's bidding, and came to a showy stop just in front of Harry.  He looked the younger boy over disdainfully.  "What is it, Baron?"

            "Lend Potter your broom, Malfoy," the Baron ordered.

            The familiar sneer crossed the boy's face.  _This must be Draco's father,_ Harry thought.  "You've got to be kidding.  It's a _Starfire_.  They're the best brooms ever made.  I'm not lending it to some scruffy Gryffindor."

            "Oh yes you are," another tall, good looking Slytherin boy had come down to hover close enough to hear.  It was Tom Riddle.  It had to be.  Harry could never forget that encounter in the Chamber of Secrets.  He held his breath, wondering why the future Lord Voldemort would ever take the side of a Gryffindor needing a broom.  "Whatever has us trapped here is beyond the reach of any one house.  You don't want to stay stuck in Hogwarts forever, do you?  If the Baron's got an idea, and it takes a "scruffy Gryffindor" to implement it, then a broom's not too much to ask."

            Harry watched the battle of wills warily.  It wasn't all that much of a surprise when Lucius lost.  Even knowing that Riddle would grow up to be Voldemort wasn't enough to counteract the strength of his personality.  Harry held very still, hoping that Riddle wouldn't look at him more carefully.  There was no telling what he might remember... or if there'd been a Potter uncle or someone who resembled Harry and had been a rival.  He was surprised that his scar wasn't hurting like mad.  Malfoy was losing years by the minute.

            As an eleven year old Lucius passed over the broom with bad grace, Riddle bestowed a smile of polite command on Harry that changed subtly, as he got a better look.  "Have we met?"

            "Not yet," Harry said nervously.  "But... no time now."  He nodded at Malfoy. "Thanks for the broom."  He mounted quickly and flew toward the stage before Riddle could decide he wanted to continue the conversation.  When he glanced back, he saw Riddle still staring after him, and Malfoy arguing with the Bloody Baron.

            Madam Pomfrey was working with a lanky wizard with skin the color of chocolate, trapping house-elves off the wall with a long-handled net before wrapping them onto their beds. "Careful, Woodwalker," she was saying.  "Don't chase them into flight or we'll lose another one to that cyclone."  When she saw Harry her eyes lit up with relief.  "Have you brought them?  Severus and Minerva?"

            "Almost," Harry told her, hovering.  "I need Filch."

            "With Hagrid," the wizard said curtly, nodding the direction.  "Come on, Poppy," he told her.  "Just a few more, and then I'll give Sprout a rest."

            Harry found Filch sitting at the end of Hagrid's bed, trying to contain the antics of a small, hyperactive kitten as it curled with mock ferocity around his thumb.  He had a bandage wrapped around his head, but seemed otherwise unchanged from the cranky old man Harry had always known.  He scowled when Harry landed next to the bed.  

            "What do you want?" he asked.

            "Professor Snape needs you," Harry said. "I'm to take you to him."  He did his best to sound as if it were a foregone conclusion – a necessity that couldn't be denied, but he was still astonished when Filch instantly passed the kitten over to Hagrid.  

            "Is Minerva with him?" the caretaker asked, mounting quickly on the broom behind Harry.  

            "Yes," Harry said.  "Hold on."

            "Fly careful like!" Hagrid called after them.

            Professor Trelawney waved a scarf at Harry as he brought the broom into the air, and shouted something about hurrying, but he didn't wait to answer.  He dodged the thread of silver cyclone and flew down to the doors, rather pleased with how much better Filch was at being a passenger on a broom than Draco had been.

            It was a definite advantage when they got outside into the wind.  It had got fiercer, if anything, and Harry used Filch's extra bulk to help steer the broom the way he wanted it to go.  He saw a single lantern still flickering on the lawn and headed for it.

            Draco had taken charge of the lantern while the others carried the stretchers.  He held it close with his good arm, shielding it from the wind.  He was the first to see Harry and Filch arrive, and he shouted at the others to make a wind break once they'd put down the two injured teachers.

            Harry hadn't known that Filch could move so fast, without a secret passageway.  The caretaker paused for a moment by McGonagall before moving on to Snape.  Harry had to use the Hear-Muffs to listen over the wind.

            "Potter said you needed me."

            "Yes." Snape fumbled at a button on his collar until a small silver key appeared.  "You know the box, under my bed.  The one you mustn't touch?"

            "Of course.  It makes it difficult to dust down there."

            "Use this on it.  Once the key is turned, it will be safe enough to open.  There are three potions inside.  Bring me both the bottle on the right, and the one from the center.  Your right as you face the key hole, remember."  Snape sounded like he was in a lot of pain.  "Don't confuse them, Argus.  I'll need to know which is which, before I taste them."

            "And the one on the left?" Filch asked.

            "Wrong emergency."  Snape said, handing the key to Filch.

            Harry braced himself for another broom ride, but Filch only stood and looked up at the castle in a calculating way.

            "We're close enough," he muttered, and walked off, away from the light.

            "Wait!  Mr. Filch!" Harry called, but it was too late.  For a moment he thought he saw a square of blackness even darker than the windy night, and then Filch vanished.


	17. Of Potions

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer:  This is all Rowling's, y'know.  Except the bits I borrowed from Ozma and Jinx, anyway...

            Chapter 17: Of Potions...

            Summary: Filch returns.

            ************

            Harry stared after Filch in disbelief.  He _couldn't _have Apparated.  Even if everything had gone so strange that the barriers against Apparation were down, Harry was pretty sure that Filch didn't have enough magic to manage it. 

            "It's all right, Mr. Potter," Professor McGonagall said, her auburn hair streaming sideways in the wind.  "Mr. Filch can travel quite quickly when there's need to."

            "I guess so," Harry said.  He crouched by Professor Snape.  "Should we wait for him here, or head for the castle, do you think?" he asked. "This broom might work for a little longer."

            "Wait," Snape said curtly.  For a man who'd been being carried he was breathing pretty hard.

            "Is everyone all right up at the Great Hall?" Draco asked.  "I mean, magic still works and all?"

            Harry shrugged.  "Some of it does, anyway.  But the chalkboard's not working now.  And almost half the enchantment on the ceiling's gone.  That vortex thing's gotten a lot bigger."

            McGonagall and Snape exchanged worried glances.  "And which 'vortex thing' is that, Mr. Potter?" McGonagall asked.

            "It's like a tornado in a movie, or a waterspout," Harry said.  "About four feet across at the top, but thinner going down.  They've got people throwing things into it to interrupt it, but it comes back.  I heard Madam Pomfrey say they'd lost a house-elf into it."

            "It looked like it was trying to get to Dum... Professor Dumbledore," Draco put in.  .

            "It still does," Harry said.  "Only there're about half a hundred teachers in the way."  He rubbed at his forehead nervously. "The Hall's full of people.  From what I saw, the time slippage goes back at least fifty years.  Maybe more."  

            "You can't tell that," Draco said, scornfully.  "You're guessing."

            "Not really," Harry said thoughtfully, not bothering to explain.  He didn't think Draco knew about Myrtle or Tom Riddle, and from the expressions on McGonagall's and Snape's faces they'd thought of at least one person Harry could recognize from that far back.

            Luckily, just then Lupin interrupted the conversation by abandoning the lined up students who formed the windbreak and jumping over Snape to run out onto the grass.  "Help me catch it!" he shouted.

            _Catch what?_ Harry wondered, even as he stumbled to his feet and followed.  Cho and the rest were coming too – he hoped that Draco had the sense to stay and guard the teachers.

            Lupin was jumping after something so dark it was hard to see, something big and flapping.  He caught a corner of it and was nearly pulled off the ground as it belled out in the wind.  Harry remembered the broom in his hand at last and jumped onto it from a run, letting the wind carry him toward the thing.  Even though it was as black as barrier above him, it didn't have the same strange way of swallowing stray leaves.  Harry only felt a small pang of fright as he grabbed for a corner of it.

            It felt like a rug – heavy cloth, with an extra layer of threads on it. Harry dragged it down towards the ground, between him and Lupin they were able to get it close enough to ground for the others to catch hold of it, too.  They had to work along the edges and pull it out on the ground to keep the wind from picking it up again.  Harry sprawled sideways to keep down his corner, holding onto the broom with the crook of his knee as he used the length of his body to pin the black cloth to the grass.

            A hand came out of the cloth and grabbed his arm.

            Before he even had a chance to scream it was followed by a head, and Harry found himself nose to nose with Mr. Filch.  The caretaker scowled at him.  "Potter.  Hold still, boy.  I wasn't expecting to have to climb out."

            "That's all right," Harry squeaked.  He tried not to mind having Filch use him as a ladder – it was an emergency after all – but he couldn't help but feel very strange about holding himself on the ground and having someone climb past him like he was on the edge of a lake or something.  He tried wiggling his fingers, to see if they'd go down into wherever it was Filch was coming out of, but they only stubbed against the cloth.  "Ouch," he said, as a hobnailed boot caught his elbow.

            "Sorry,"  said Filch getting to his feet and bracing against the wind. "Thank you."  Harry had the feeling that the caretaker wasn't speaking to him.  And then, abruptly, he was sprawled on wet grass.  He heard the exclamations of the others as he rolled over to stare up at Filch. 

            "How did you...?" he asked.

            Filch almost smiled.  "Shortcut."  He reached down to catch Harry's hand and pull him upright, helping Harry to disentangle himself from the broom.  "Which way do you think gets us back to Professor Snape?"

            Harry looked around.  He could still see the lights up in Gryffindor Tower, but they'd been pulled around the corner of the castle, and there wasn't any light at ground level.  "Into the wind, I think."

            "Are you all right, Mr. Filch?" Cho Chang came over, towing a skinny youngster.  "Come on, Lupin, he won't bite you."

            "His cat will," Lupin muttered sullenly.  He hung onto Cho, though.  If he hadn't the wind would have blown him sideways.  Harry knew the feeling.  If Filch didn't have hold of his arm he'd have trouble keeping on his own feet.

            "I'm fine," Filch growled.  "How many of you lot are there here?"

            "Eight."  It was Cedric Diggory, dragging two smaller ones with him.  "Including Harry.  I counted while we were hanging onto that rug.  He handed one person to Cho and the other to Filch.  "Hang onto these two while I fetch the others, will you?

            "Diggory?"  Filch whispered, and Harry was glad to see that the caretaker was just as gut-punched as Harry had felt earlier.  

            "It's all right," Harry told him, grateful that someone had given him Hear-Muffs too, so that no one would have to shout to make Filch hear.  "At least, Professor McGonagall said it was.  Just don't ... don't tell him."

            "I don't think he'd hear it if I did," Filch said in a low voice.  He squinted after Diggory, who was trying to bring the last two students back to the group.  "Give him a hand, Potter.  You're tall enough now."

            *****

            Cloaks looked good, and made warm outer layers most of the time, but they made walking into the wind a lot harder than it had to be, especially when you had to hang onto the hands of the people next to you in line.  Cho gave up and let hers go first, but the others imitated her quickly enough the next time they paused to rest.  Harry felt badly about turning his loose.  He had a feeling that anything that hit the barrier was gone forever – and with the wind the way it was, there wasn't much chance of the cloaks doing anything else.

            Filch led the way, holding onto Diggory, then Cho and the other students, with Lupin after them and Harry bringing up the rear in case someone came loose and he had to chase them down with the broom.  All of the students, even Diggory, kept sliding up and down in age, much more rapidly than the people in the Great Hall had.  Lupin called Harry "James" once, when he was smaller.  But Harry noticed that Filch stayed the same.  Just as well, really, or the line wouldn't have had a reliable anchor.

            Five minutes walk and they reached the angle of the castle and could see Draco, Snape, McGonagall watching for them, huddled together.  It took another five minutes to get to them though, leaning into the wind the whole way. 

            As they finally got within shouting distance, Draco called "You might have done better to go 'round!"  He held up someone's cloak.  "Look!"

            They worked their way forward, and Diggory led the line of students to make a new wind break, Cho hanging on tight to his hand.  By the time Harry had managed to get close enough to watch with the rest, Filch was sitting next to Snape, pulling bottles out of two different pockets.

            "Center," he said, giving Snape one of the bottles.  "Right," he went on, holding up the other.

            "Good."  Snape used his teeth to break the wax seal and pull the cork before taking a long swig.  He jerked a little, from the strength of it and then passed it to McGonagall, already looking improved.  "Here.  Just a swallow, mind.  You're not used to it."

            She took the bottle gingerly between her palms and let a little of its contents onto her tongue.  "Ah...  I went through a good bit of this stuff a few years back," she told Snape and took a healthy swallow, shuddering gratefully.  "Nicely blended.  I never can get the arnica this subtle."

            "Arnica isn't meant to be subtle," Snape growled.  "Malfoy, help me get this bandage off."

            Draco pulled a face, but he began unwrapping the bandage while Snape took the second bottle and opened it with a small knife from his pocket, muttering under his breath.  Harry listened harder, and realized that Snape was counting.  "Twenty thousand, twenty one thousand, twenty two thousand..."  His face was losing the pinched look as the seconds passed, although the pallor only eased a little.  Once the leg was bare he swallowed, and kept counting until he reached sixty and then poured six drops of the second potion out over the length of the cut, protecting the bottle from the wind with one hand.  Green smoke billowed up, to be whipped away by the wind almost right away.  Under it, the cut sealed itself, leaving a thin whitish scar.

            "That's wonderful," Draco said admiringly.  "Does it work on anything?"

            "No," Snape said, rather smugly, "But what it does work on, it works on very well indeed.  Hold out your hands, Minerva." He measured out four drops onto her hands and she rubbed them together, looking relieved as the effect spread out from her palms.

            "Why not use it all the time, though?" Harry asked.  "I mean, if it works that well."

            "Because he's probably used 300 galleons worth of it just on the two of us," McGonagall answered.  "And as good as it is, it won't replace the blood he's lost, Mr. Malfoy, so I suggest you stay close as we go up the stairs."

            Draco stopped rubbing his arm suggestively and nodded.  "Yes, Professor."

            "300 galleons?  For ten drops?" Harry exclaimed.  "That's thirty galleons a drop!"

            "Very good, Potter.  Perhaps you should take on the challenge of Arithmancy next term," Snape said snidely. "Mr. Filch, how bad is that head injury?"

            "Not bad enough for HealWell Salve," Filch said sourly.  "And there's plenty in the Great Hall could use it.  Professor Flitwick for one.  He was still unconscious last I knew."

            "Would it heal Professor Dumbledore?"  Harry asked.  He fidgeted with the broom at his side. "I think this broom works well enough.  One of us could fly it up to Madam Pomfrey."

            Snape shook his head, suddenly somber.  "HealWell Salve has drawbacks, Potter.  If I'd used it before I'd taken the Restorus Potion it would have healed my leg and left me in a coma for the next six weeks.  Without knowing which potions and spells Madam Pomfrey has already used – not to mention the other teachers you've told me are there – well, I shouldn't like to risk it."

            "You could fly up there," Harry said, offering the broom.  It was almost snatched out of his hand by the wind.

            "In this storm?" McGonagall objected.  "One bad gust and you'll crash into the castle wall, breaking you _and_ the potion bottles, and then where would we be?"

            "Worse off," Snape admitted.  He was getting younger, Harry thought, and so was McGonagall.  But Filch _still_ hadn't changed.  

            The caretaker pulled himself upright and took charge.  "It will have to be the stairs, then, won't it?  Come along, you lot.  You're wasting time."


	18. Home Before Dark

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer:  Lots of borrowings from JKR, some from Ozma, some from Jinx, I just write the stuff.

            Chapter 18: Home Before Dark

            Summary:  With the professors healed, the party is finally able to get back to the Castle.

            ************

            Once again Harry found himself crossing the lawn toward the stairs that led up to the Great Hall.  The wind was so strong that even with everyone hanging on to each other, they had to struggle to stay on their feet.  To make thing worse, they kept getting hit with small bits of trees, or stones, that stung their faces, and now and then they got knocked sideways by another one of the loose capes.  Harry had to really concentrate to stay much taller than the broom he carried because he was so tired.  But, to tell the truth, only Filch was having any luck at keeping his proper height for more than a minute or two.  Even Professor McGonagall went young enough to stumble on her skirts once or twice, and the look of gratitude she gave Harry when he caught her made him blush.  Snape and Draco took it in turns pulling each other along as one or the other of them was the taller.  It was usually Snape, which Harry thought was a good sign, even if the Potions Professor still seemed to be favoring his injured leg.    

            He looked over his shoulder and saw Cedric and Cho, tucked close together, talking somehow, despite the horrible wind.  He remembered seeing them at... when... it had been a feast, hadn't it?  And he'd been jealous.  The Yule Ball.  How stupid of him not to notice that they liked each other before he'd even asked her to be his partner.  He hadn't paid attention.  But looking at them now, all he could think was how much they seemed to fit next one another.  He hoped Cho was saying the things she'd meant to say, but he was careful not to listen.  He wasn't the one she wanted to say them to.

            In spite of the wind, they finally reached the main staircase, and Filch, without asking, pulled the entire group to the sheltered side of it, where they could stop and catch their breaths.  Harry stumbled as he tried to get in close enough to the wall to feel sheltered from the wind, and the broom in his hand knocked against Draco's back.

            "Ouch!  Blast it, Potter!  Can't you just toss that useless thing away?" Draco yelped, snatching at the handle to suit actions to words.

            Harry hung on.  "If someone falls off the stairs, I'm going to need it to catch them," he shouted back.  "And besides, I don't expect you'd want to me lose _two_ Malfoys' brooms in one day!"

            "Two Malfoys?"  Draco's eyes widened as he found an elaborate coat of arms burned into the wood of the broomhandle and he paled.  "This is my father's," he stammered.  "He keeps it over the mantelpiece with the shield he won for racing.  How did you get it?"

            "He lent it to me.  Up in the Great Hall, when I went to get Fil... Mr. Filch," Harry said, suddenly aware that the others were watching the spat.  "It's a good broom," he added, as reluctant mollification, since Draco was losing years again and it made him feel like a bully to be arguing with anyone that much shorter than he was.

            "Do you think you really can catch us if one of us falls off the stairs?" Justin Finch-Fletchley asked Harry, staring up the wall beside them.  The edges of wide stone banisters were only visible on this side of the wall for  few yards above them, before the light of the lamps was swallowed in darkness but they'd all climbed the stairs often enough to imagine what would happen to anyone who was blown over the railing.

            "Well, I'd try anyway," Harry said, trying not to think about it too much.  If the winds kept blowing a person around the castle, he might have a chance of catching them.  But if they ran into a wall...  "I'd rather not have to, though."

            "I wish we'd thought to bring the rope," Draco said.  "We could tie ourselves in a line.  That way if one person got caught by the wind, the rest of us could anchor him down."

            "Maybe if we crawled up the stairs?" Cho suggested.

            "How are we going to hang onto each other if we're crawling?" Lupin said.  He looked to  Snape, Filch and McGonagall.  "Aren't there other ways in?  Something closer to ground level?"

            Snape and McGonagall both went much older. "Kitchens?" Snape said.

            "Blocked," McGonagall said, "As soon as the alarm went up about the Balrog.  The lake passage?"

            "Not unless we can find a supply of gillyweed in the dark.  And it would mean going back down the hill in the wind."

"You don't have any?" McGonagall asked, eyebrow raised.

"Not enough. The Quidditch Tunnel?"

"Blocked off, like the rest." McGonagall dismissed the possibility.

"It may have opened up again once the balrog was defeated," Snape pointed out.

"Do you really want to walk halfway 'round the castle to find out that it hasn't?" Minerva asked wryly.  "Helga's sett?"

            Snape made a face.  "I think I've lost enough blood for one day.  I'm not inclined to try to make my way past a colony of enraged badgers.  And no, the old passage to the dungeons won't do either. It's been rigged to discourage visitors."

            "Godric's Gate is out of the question," McGonagall said.  "For much the same reasons.  Although, you'd think the castle might consider helping us.  There really must be a way in."

            Snape turned an unwavering regard on Filch.  "I can think of one."

            To Harry's surprise, Filch flushed and shook his head.  "No.  I won't.  You can't help Dumbledore if you're half dead."

            "Ah, but the last time I was a fully adult wizard, with the ... scars ... to prove it," Snape said, in the uncompromisingly reasonable tone that meant he wasn't going to let you have a hope of winning the argument.  "That's not a condition that always applies, now."

            "It is easier on youngsters," Professor McGonagall put in, resting a hand on Filch's arm.  "And it's certainly easier – and safer -- than trying to get up those steps in this hurricane."

            Filch looked at her for a long moment, and then nodded.  "All right," he said gruffly.  "I can only take two at a time, though.  I've only got two hands.  And I'm not looking forward to cleaning up after you lot."

            "Fair enough," McGonagall said.  She looked around the small group.  "Now everyone, I want you to try to imagine yourselves crossing the lake, coming to Hogwarts for the first time..."

            Harry wanted to get inside as much as any of them, but he was too interested in what Filch was doing to concentrate properly on that first boat trip at Hogwarts.  The caretaker had stepped to the tallest bit of the wall and nodded slightly to it, as if he were acknowledging another person.  And in response, a square of blackness appeared against the stone.  Almost immediately, it started to slide to the left, and Harry grabbed for an edge, realizing that it was the same – or nearly the same – as the cloth that Filch had climbed out of on the lawn.  "Grab two people and go!" he shouted, but Filch had already thought of that.  With a tight grip on one of Justin's arms, and a Ravenclaw girl's shoulder, he ran for the wall and the cloth under Harry's hand vanished.

            Harry found himself breathing hard, like he'd run a race, as he stared around at the others.  No one said anything, waiting, and then the rough stone went to cloth again and Filch reappeared through it.  Harry leaned against it, not letting the eddies of wind sneak under the edges.

            "Did it work?" Professor McGonagall said, catching Filch before the wind could knock him sideways.  "Argus, are they safe?"

            "Yes."  Filch said, looking around the group with wild eyes as he steadied himself.  "But you're not young enough yet!" he scolded Snape.

            "I'm working on it!" Snape growled.  "Take the ones who are!"

            "Do we have to think of the boats?" Cho asked McGonagall, as Filch grabbed two more children and vanished, and the cloth with him.

            "Anything that makes you feel eleven," Draco told her.  He looked like he was having as much trouble as Harry was, concentrating.  But in Draco's case it was because he kept watching Snape.  "Try the Sorting Hat song from your first year.  It worked once."

            "Good suggestion," Snape said, and closed his eyes to think, hanging onto Draco's shoulder.

            The cloth came back – it felt different, and thicker this time – and Filch came out just in time to see Cho whisper something into Cedric's ear that sent them both to giggling first years.  For a moment, the caretaker hesitated, but only for a moment.  Then he took each of them by the hand and pulled them back through his door of cloth.

            That left Draco, Lupin, Snape, McGonagall and Harry.  And _none _of them were young enough.  Harry had a feeling that Snape was having trouble with it, and so was Lupin, and although McGonagall was growing younger in fits and starts, her concentration was broken every time Filch came through.  Draco seemed to be trying to protect Snape – which was keeping him older.  

            When Filch appeared this time, he stumbled on the way through and had to sit.  Harry and Lupin leaned on the edges of the fresh cloth, watching the others.

            "Minerva," Snape said, with an edge of complaint.  "The boats aren't working."

            "Try harder," she ordered him, and gained five years.

            "Try something else," Draco said.  "Think."

            Snape glared at him for a moment, but then his expression changed and he gave Draco a frosty smile before turning to Filch.  "Don't just sit there like a lump, man, chew me out!"

            "What?" Filch exclaimed.

            "Dress me down," Snape explained through gritted teeth.  "Dock me points, invent detentions..."

            Professor McGonagall got it first.  "What were you thinking, Mr. Snape?  The assignment was to turn the matchstick into a needle, not a toothpick!"

            Filch chimed in, getting to his feet to loom as well as he could over where Snape was sitting.  "There's two inches of stone floor eaten away by the muck that overflowed from your cauldron, Mr. Snape, and you're going to help me restore that floor and then you're going to polish it!"

            "Your penmanship is atrocious, and illegible, and you will have to take the mark for what I thought I read on that essay, and not on your impromptu translation in class."  McGonagall said, her hair gone silver once more.

            "Whatever Potter and his lot did to you, it doesn't excuse pouring slugslime all down the Gryffindor table, and you're going to clean up every last drop of it without magic!" Filch was getting into Snape's face now.  "And I've had enough bloodstains to clean up from you and Black for this year, thank you!"

            The mention of Sirius Black was a mistake, Harry thought, because Snape had been losing years – even if it was slowly -- but that sent him older again.  Filch seemed to realize it though, and started in about some kind of mess on the ceiling of the Potions classroom.

            Harry felt a tug on his sleeve and turned to see Lupin, slid down to about sixteen.  "What are we doing, James?" he asked, jerking a thumb at the three adults.

            "Trying to get Professor Snape to feel like he's eleven," Harry answered.  "And not lose this cloth at the same time."

            "Oh."  Lupin said, and then grinned and reached out a foot to tap against Draco's leg.  When the fair haired boy looked up, Lupin motioned him to come and take his place holding the cloth against the wall.

            Draco glanced over for Harry's nod first, but he got up and took one side of the cloth.  He and Harry watched curiously as Lupin crouched down to avoid the wind and moved around behind Snape.  The someday Defense against the Dark Arts Teacher gave McGonagall a cheerful thumbs up from behind Snape, who seemed to have stalled out at around twenty five or so and was rubbing absently at his arm as he glared back at Filch and McGonagall.

            Harry concentrated on Lupin, wondering what the young marauder had in mind.  Whatever it was, he was enjoying the thought of it, gleeful and ready to pounce as he waited for a gap in Filch's and McGonagall's expostulations.

            It came in a moment, and Lupin tapped on Snape's shoulder. Snape turned – for a moment they were nearly nose to nose – and Lupin opened his mouth to bleat like a distressed sheep.  "Baaaaaaa!"

            It worked!   Well, almost.  Snape slammed downwards in age, but stopped while he still had the gawkiness of fourteen.

            Then Lupin tweaked his nose.

            That was it.

            Eleven.

            And attacking.

            Lupin dropped years too, the moment Snape punched him.  Professor McGonagall pushed the two combatants at Filch, who grabbed one under each arm and turned to run at the cloth.  It seemed to Harry that Filch was having to work harder each time he stepped through, but it certainly wasn't stopping him.  Then the cloth vanished.  Harry leaned against the rough stone, wondering if Snape and Lupin would get through safely.

            McGonagall got up and came to stand near Draco and Harry.  "It will have to be you two next, I think," she said.  "Although heaven help me if all you remember is how much you were at each other's throats First Year."

            "Shouldn't it be you?" Draco asked.  "I mean, there's not much point in getting you all the way back here to save the Headmaster if we don't see you get inside."

            "It should, Mr. Malfoy," she admitted.  "But I'm feeling very old at the moment."

            Harry looked from her to Draco.  He had an idea.   Two really.  "You don't look old," he told McGonagall.  "In fact, you look quite young."  Draco blinked and frowned so Harry went on, signalling Draco to follow his lead with the fingers of the hand that was holding the broom..  "I mean.  You've got really nice..."

            "Teeth," Draco put in, smiling encouragingly.    "And your hair is nice too."

            McGonagall looked from one to the other of them with amused disbelief, but her cheeks colored nicely and so did her hair as she slid down the years.  

            "It's lovely hair," Harry said, glad for the chance to be unmistakably sincere.  He reached out for her hand and she dropped a few more years as she let him take it.  "And you've got a wonderful shape to your face."

            "Good bones," Draco said.  "And good eyebrows.  Not all clumpy like some people's."

            In spite of herself, McGonagall smiled.  She was almost young enough to forget her adult self now, and Harry could feel rough cloth forming between himself and the wall.  "You're beautiful," he said.

            Filch was coming out of the cloth, and McGonagall was seventeen, her eyes confused, but still too old to go through with Filch.  Harry, on impulse, leaned over to kiss her on the cheek.

            It wasn't a very romantic kiss.  More of a peck than a kiss, really, but McGonagall's hand grew much smaller in his, and she smiled up at him shyly, twisting her free hand in her skirts.

            "You go with Mr. Filch, all right?" Harry told her, feeling tall and gawky.  He passed her over to Filch, who was looking quite startled at McGonagall's transformation.  The Caretaker looked at her as if she were a porcelain figurine that he dared not drop, and picked her up just as gently.  Then he turned to look at the boys, his free hand hesitating between them.

Harry shoved the broom into Draco's hands.  "Take this to your father," he said, and Draco lost five inches.  Filch grabbed the young Slytherin, glaring at Harry.  "I'll be all right till you come back," Harry insisted.  Filch  made an impatient noise, and nodded, but he headed toward the wall, his teeth gritted together as he hitched his two burdens up under his arms before vanishing back through his cloth.

            Draco had taken the lantern with him.

            It was dark.

            Harry huddled against the wall and wondered how long it would be until Filch came back.  Unable to think of anything else, he began to count.  One thousand and one.  One thousand and two...

            He'd be grateful for lightning.

            One thousand and eleven... One thousand and twelve...

            The darkness seemed to get darker.  That was impossible.

            One thousand and twenty two...

            But everything that had happened today was impossible.

            One thousand and thirty...

He didn't mind most darkness, but this was really dark -- like the inside of the cupboard when the light had burnt out – that awful total blackness that you _knew_ had _things_ in it...

One thousand and forty two...

*************


	19. Back Inside

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: Tisn't mine, tis true.  Thanks to Ozma for her Squib Doors (yes, you should go read her stories, now!—er, well, just as soon as you read mine, anyway), Jinx for people and other things, and JKRowling who started it all... 

            Chapter 19: Back inside

            Summary: Meanwhile, back in the Great Hall...

            ************

            _Something's gone wrong._

Harry curled himself into a ball, huddling against the wall, trying not to get caught by the wind.__

_            It didn't work.  They're in trouble.  They're hurt.  _

_...or dead._

The darkness howled around him.  

The wind.  The wind howled.  _Darkness can't howl._

_Things in darkness can._

_Maybe another monster came.  Another balrog, only this time it got **inside**..._

_No.  It'd get blown out by all this wind._

            He had to get inside.  

He couldn't even leave the wall.

_What if they don't remember where I am?  What if they've forgotten all about coming to fetch me, with all the time changing and such?  What if they don't remember **me**?_

            _Hermione will remember me,_ Harry told himself firmly.  _Hermione remembers **everything.**__And Ron would never forget me._        

            _But they don't know where I am, do they?  And it's not like Draco's going to go out of his way to save me._

The wind tugged at his hair and clothes no matter how small he made himself.  If he stayed out here much longer, he was going to get blown away, and then he'd be blown out into that strange barrier and that would be the end of him.  For once Harry wished that he was as heavyset as his cousin, or better still his uncle.  Uncle Vernon could probably stand still in a hurricane.  Of course, he'd find a way to blame the storm on Harry.... 

A hand fell on his shoulder, gripping hard.  "No!" Harry cried, ducking away from the blow that was sure to follow.  He was so small he stepped right out of his shoes.  The muddy grass pulled wetly at his stockings as he fought to get away.  "Uncle Vernon, I didn't mean to --  "

            "Blast it, Potter!" Filch growled, stepping away from the wall in order to keep his grip on Harry's shirt.  "Don't make me lose my Door!"

            "Your what?" Harry squeaked, recognizing the Caretaker belatedly, trying to freeze, and failing as the wind caught him and nearly pulled him out of Filch's grasp.  He grabbed for the caretaker's wrist, just before something wrapped itself around both of them, trapping him against Filch and then pushing both of them off their feet.  Harry nearly choked on the mingled smells of soap and dust and fresh vomit on Filch's coat. The wind must have caught the cloth and the cloth had entangled both of them on its way.  They'd be blown out of the world, without a chance to catch hold anywhere and save themselves.  Harry felt the rough texture of needlework where the wind plastered the material forcefully against his face and hands, and then, abruptly, the sensation changed. 

            It was like getting poked by about a million dull needles – for a few seconds, Harry was sure that he was being examined, all the way down to his bones – and then most of the sensation went away, except for the tingling ache that concentrated on the place where his scar crossed his forehead.   

            Gradually, he sorted out other sensations.  Filch was tugging on his shoulder, drawing him forward, but Harry didn't want to move, in case it set off another round of the strange, prying almost-pain.  Carefully, he raised his right hand, still clutching Filch's wrist with his left, and reached forward like a blind boy seeking out warning for the obstacles that would hurt worst.

            An adult hand fitted itself into his, and Harry blinked as the pain in his head vanished.  

            Filch was still on his left, still pulling on him, and the new person pulled gently as well.  Harry swallowed and stepped forward, letting his two guides draw him on.

            It was like walking through water – really _thick_ water -- but a few moments took him to a place where the resistance ended.  

            Harry stepped out into the noisy confusion of the Great Hall.

            They were near the back of the dais, near the bunks of the injured house-elves.  Filch, still gripping Harry's shirt, had stepped back, arched like his cat, as if he were expecting Harry to throw up all over him.  He was staring at the man on Harry's right.

            _He_ looked like a king: tall and muscular, with a mane of dark red hair, wearing gold robes embroidered in red, and a swordbelt.  The man smiled down at Harry.  He looked familiar, somehow, although Harry wasn't sure why.  He ruffled Harry's hair with one hand and then stepped away, vanishing into the patch of shadow in the corner.

            "Gryffindor?" Filch whispered.  Harry stared up at the caretaker, enlightened and alarmed.

            "Godric Gryffindor?"   And much younger than the picture on his Chocolate Frog card.  Harry wouldn't be much surprised to see Merlin himself, next. Not the way today'd been going.

            No one else seemed to have noticed.  The house-elves were too lost in their daze, and the rest of the people nearest them were busy or ill, or looking upwards.  In the high reaches of the Hall, brooms swept around the rafters as their riders threw old clothes, silverware, and plates at the greatly lengthened  and thickened tendril of the whirlpool. 

            "Leave off!" a shrill shout echoed piercingly off a nearby wall.

            "Give it here!"   That angry shout sounded uncomfortably familiar to Harry's ear.  He pushed forward past the teachers to see Neville Longbottom shielding a house-elf from a furious Tom Riddle.

            "No!"  Neville insisted, pale with determination.   "You'll throw him in the whirlpool!"

            Riddle's face was red with fury.  "Do you want to get us all killed for the sake of a house-elf?  The last one that went in stopped that thing for a full five minutes!"

            "That would be murder!" Hermione was charging her way through the crowds of yattering students towards Neville, Ron at her heels, and a trail of other bookbearing researchers behind him.  

            "That would be survival," a tall Ravenclaw whom Harry didn't know said regretfully, hovering on her broom.  "Nothing's even slowing the whirlpool down, now.  Better a house-elf than the headmaster."  A lot of the students – and some of the teachers – were nodding agreement.

            "But it doesn't have anything t-t-t-o d-d-do..." Neville was too excited to get words out.  He bit his lip in frustration and reached into his pocket, pulling out the Remembrall he'd gotten in his first year.  "Look!"  He cocked back his arm and threw the crystalline ball, straight as a string, into the heart of the whirlpool.

            The vortex blinked out.

            All the voices in the Hall went silent in surprise, except for Dean Thomas's call of "Well thrown!" 

            "It eats m-magic," Neville said, with more certainty, his words loud in the momentary quiet.  "We need to throw magic things into it to slow it down."

            "But... how will we get them back?"  Ron asked.  "Strong enchantments cost money."

            "I don't think we can," Hermione said. 

            Tom Riddle frowned, hovering higher, where everyone could see him, but moving away from Neville.  "What do you suggest then?  We're not going to throw our wands at it!"

            "Portraits, from the corridors?"  suggested a Hufflepuff, and then sagged a little.  "But no one's in them, right now.  They might not be magic enough."

            "_I_ know what to use," Filch rasped out, stepping from behind Harry to the center of the stage, and startling even Riddle out of his posturing. "The torches in the halls will hold it off for now, but I've got better still.  You lot," he called to the flyers, "I need some of you to come with me down to my office."

            "We know the way!"  James Potter swooped down to hover near the caretaker, with two other boys following him more circumspectly.  James was grinning all over his fifteen-year-old face.  "Come on, Mr. Filch. You must've confiscated enough Exploding Snaps and Boobytrap Bubbles off of us to slow that thing down for hours."  He held out a hand to Filch, who took it with the most incredulous expression Harry had ever seen.

            "No funny stuff, Potter," he growled, mounting behind the boy, who aged a little as he blushed. 

            "Wouldn't dream of it, Mr. Filch," he said.   Then he hesitated, seeing Harry for the first time.  "Cousin?" he asked, peering down at his son.

            A heavy hand landed on Harry's shoulder before he could answer, and Snape's cloak swung massively around as the Potions Master stepped forward, like a woolen wall separating the two boys.  "Distant relation," Snape said icily.

            Harry glared up at him, but Snape was staring over Hermione's shoulder, at her research team, at the red-haired girl with arms brimful of books.  He looked haggard and old.  Deliberately Snape broke her gaze and turned his onyx eyes upon James.  "There isn't time now for reunions," he said harshly.  "Not if we're to get out of this alive."  His hand trembled upon Harry's shoulder, years falling away as he faced his boyhood nemesis.

            James aged a little, almost to graduating age, as he met Snape's glacial hauteur.  Behind him the other two boys crowded closer.  Neither one looked much older than thirteen.

            "Merlin's eyebrows!" exclaimed the heavyset one.  "The greaseball grew up to be a teacher!"

            "He's not the only one."  Remus Lupin stepped up on Harry's other side, casually taking half-a-step more to put himself between his old friends and Snape. 

"Remus?" The last boy said, and grew taller, even as he gave Lupin a wondering grin. 

"You're meant to be helping Filch, Sirius." Lupin said, his age slipping a little.  He stood up a little straighter to make up for it.  "Best hurry."

            "Right," James saluted briskly and summoned the other two with his head, "Come on, Peter" he said, forestalling another round of comments, and turned his broom towards the door.  "Hang on, Mr. Filch."  The other two shrugged at each other and followed.

            Harry glared past Snape's left arm and Lupin's right, focusing on the departing trio.  "That's Pettigrew?" He reached for his wand.

            Snape tightened his grip painfully. "You can't change it backwards, Harry." He warned in a low voice.

            "You wouldn't _want_ to," Harry accused, watching his father, Pettigrew and Black flying away down the length of the hall.

            Snape looked down at Lily, who had come closer, and was studying Harry's face with a thoughtful air on her seventeen-year-old face. "Indeed I would," the Potions master said softly.  "But changing history will do just that, boy.  The possibilities are incalculable.  Make the wrong choice and you've killed Dumbledore, and that would kill us _all_."

            It was bitter truth.  Harry grimaced and snarled at the messenger.  "Aren't you meant to be _helping_ Dumbledore?"

            "Yes."  Snape, still holding Harry's shoulder, started to steer the boy away, but Harry resisted, remembering something important.

"Ron!" he called.

"Potter..." Snape growled, but Harry shook his head defiantly as Ron clambered up on a table to get close enough to talk above the conversations  which were rising in volume all over the Hall.

            "What is it, Harry?" Ron asked.  "Do you need me?"

            "Take Fred and George, and go after Filch.  People who aren't from _now_ don't always _stay_, and we're going to _need_ whatever it is that Filch is bringing up."  If James and the other two vanished the way that Cedric had, Filch would be left on his own, and that would cause delays.

            "Right," Ron said cheerfully, slapping one fist into his other palm.  "It'll give me a chance to give Pettigrew a fat lip."

            "Fine," Harry said. "Just don't let him know why, all right?  And try not to get into a fight with m...  with the others.  We don't want to change things too much or we might change things we don't want changed."

            Ron grinned.  "You didn't come up with _that_ on your own," he said.  "Don't worry, Harry. Hermione'd go spare if I did anything that might mess things up. She's been on about it for hours."

            "Go on then," Harry said, waving Ron off.  He looked for Hermione, meaning to say something to her, but she and Lily had been accosted by a small boy with an opened book, and were bending to read something.

             Snape, reassured that Harry and Ron were going to mind the consequences of their actions, had turned to address the werewolf, although he still held onto Harry. "Lupin, make yourself useful," he ordered.  

            "How?" Remus asked.

            "That one," Snape said, indicating Tom Riddle with a subtle move of his head.  "The tall Slytherin boy."

            "The one organizing parties to fetch torches?" Lupin confirmed.

            "Tom Riddle.  Keep an eye on him.  If he should age up and vanish, then _do_ something to incapacitate _that_ one.  His name is Quirrell.  Get Black to help you when he comes back.  He's good at that sort of thing."

            "Quirrell's here?" Harry's voice cracked as he swung his head around quickly in search of that horrible purple turban.  It took a moment to recognize the stammering, nervous Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher of his first year in the lanky, fair-haired, confident wizard who was helping tend to one of the injured teachers.  "He looks younger than I remember," he said, wondering if it were the lingering smell of vomit on Snape's cloak or the sight of the man he'd fought... well, that he'd killed, really, if you thought too much about it... during his first year that was making him feel queasy.

            "Too young to remember _you_," Snape clipped out peevishly, steering Harry toward the back of the stage.  They worked their way past teachers, some of whom objected, and a few of whom faded away at a touch, toward the wall under the windows.  

            The rest of the rescue party, including Draco Malfoy and a still-very-young McGonagall, were lined up sitting along a bench there, each one clutching a piece of crockery at the ready.  The Slytherin's pale skin showed up the green particularly well as he looked sourly at Harry over a porcelain punchbowl.  "How come you aren't sick, Potter?" he asked.  "All the rest of us have been."

            Harry shrugged, pinching his nose against the stink of illness.  "Luck?" he guessed, past a grimace.

            "Intervention," Snape said, looking much younger as he, too, seemed to be trying to fight off incipient nausea.  He frowned down at McGonagall.  "Come along, Minerva.  This is no time for a Head of House to sit idle.  Even Godric Gryffindor has shown up to fill in the gap for you, but we can't rely on that.  Should this phenomenon reach much farther back in time, we'll have to contend with woad wearing warriors."

            "Don't want to grow up," McGonagall said, pulling a face.  "Just means more of me to be sick."  She looked very small and stubborn, her armor rumpled and the chainmail pooled around her, one small bare foot showing through the riding slit in front, swinging defiantly above the floor.

            Snape, not much more than nineteen himself, bent down to her, holding out his free hand.  "But it also means there's more of you to fight back the feeling," he promised, in a serious tone, "which reduces the possibility that you'll actually _be_ sick."

            She blinked at him, her eyes large in her small thin face.  "You're the one who was hurt, before.  Did you go big too?"

            "I did."  

            "And it made you feel better?"

            "Yes."  

            She sighed and took Snape's hand.  "All right then.  But if you're not telling the truth I'm going to turn you into something nasty."

            Snape actually laughed.  "Too late," he said, standing and drawing her upright, his grip on Harry's shoulder tightening abruptly as his balance faltered.  _He's not mad at me,_ Harry realized,_ he just needs a crutch.  His leg must still hurt.  _He put out a hand to steady the potions professor, and noticed Draco watching jealously.  

            "Can you help yet, Draco?" he asked the other boy.

            "I can try," Draco said, gaining inches as he made himself stand.  It did seem to help, Harry noticed.  At least Draco was less green.

            McGonagall was gaining years too.  She looked a little startled when she reached adulthood, pulling up her mail skirt to look at her bare feet, and then making a face when she realized how the pitcher in her hand smelled.  "Well, we're inside," she said, putting the porcelain down on the bench quickly.  "That's something."

            "Even if we all _did_ get sick but Potter," Draco growled resentfully. "All _he's_ got all over him is _mud._"

            "It could have been worse, Mr. Malfoy," Snape said, eyes meeting McGonagall's in some silent communication that made Harry's curiosity itch.  "Much worse."

            "Worse than this?" Draco said, pointedly avoiding a damp patch on Snape's cloak.

            "That was Lupin," Snape said. "And I returned the favor."

            "But..."

            Draco's question was interrupted by the arrival of a tall, middle-aged wizard, who loomed suddenly between the nearest torch and their small group.  "Minerva?" he asked, in a rich, musical voice, eyes bright in his dark brown face.  "And Mr. Snape.  How did you get past me?  I've been waiting to meet you at the entrance to the Hall."

            "Woodwalker," McGonagall greeted him, accepting the two hands he extended to her with only the smallest of hesitations, the age-lines gathering on her face like iron filings against a magnet.  "I should have expected to see you."

            "Perhaps and perhaps not.  Young Pomfrey tells me you are the newest Heads of your Houses," Woodwalker looked from McGonagall to Snape searchingly.  "Do you fade from this place and time as we older ones do?  Is that how you came into the hall without being seen?"

            "Filch brought us in," Snape said.  "We won't fade away."

            "We might get rather shorter, however," McGonagall warned cheerfully.  "I hope you shan't all fade away now that we're here."

            "There's no time for that," Woodwalker said somberly.  "Dumbledore needs our help, _all_ our help, most urgently.  Come with me."


	20. Heads of House

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: Tisn't mine, tis true.  Thanks to Ozma for her Squib Doors (yes, you should go read her stories, now!—er, well, just as soon as you read mine, anyway), Jinx for people and other things, Ariana Deralte for her Uric the Oddball, and JKRowling who started it all... 

            Chapter 20:  Heads of House

            Summary: We want four, we've got three, we need one...

            ************

            Harry stayed with McGonagall and Snape.  Draco wasn't really steady enough yet to be a good support for the Potions professor, especially not with Snape still in chainmail, and McGonagall seemed to be glad of Harry's company. Woodwalker cleared a path for them to the most protected corner of the room. Dumbledore's bed must have been moved there while they were still out in the storm.

Several of the teachers they passed greeted McGonagall or Snape, some of them with cool disdain and some with a nod of the head, or a small bow.  Harry was startled to see Professor Lockhart tucked under a nearby bed, tied hand and foot with an elaborate scarf, and gagged with his own hat.

A young, exhausted-looking Pomfrey met them at the foot of an oversized bed, where Professor Sprout and Professor Flitwick were tucked in alongside of Dumbledore, one at each hand, and two more people, a witch and a wizard that Harry didn't know, sat at his feet and his head.  Dumbledore himself looked like a pale shadow against the pillow.  He looked his full age to Harry, or more.  His silver beard spread across the coverlet, still tangled with small sticks and matted in places with mud or worse.  After a long, frightening moment, Harry began to discern the slight movements which signalled that Dumbledore was still breathing.

For now.

"I was beginning to think you'd never get here," Pomfrey cried, bursting into tears as she burrowed against McGonagall's shoulder, and then lower against her side as the years fell away.

"It's all right," McGonagall said, patting the sobbing girl on the back..  "It's all right, Poppy.  You've done well.   And Severus has a trick or two up his sleeve.  Don't you, Professor Snape?"

Snape raised an incredulous eyebrow at McGonagall, who shrugged a little, coloring up.  Pomfrey, who had gone quite young, looked up at Snape, scrubbing at her face with her hand and frowning.  "Are you a mediwizard?"

"No." Snape said, soberly.  "But I can help."  He reached into his pockets for the potion vials that Filch had brought him.

"Thee should be takin' thy help to the wee sma' mon, then I'm thinkin'," a watching witch in a plaid robe said sourly.  "Or there willna be enow left o' Ravenclaw to hatch afresh."  She stepped forward and picked up Flitwick, passing him to Woodwalker before taking his place on the bed.  "Don't ye be wastin' time at it," she ordered, and closed her eyes.

As Woodwalker turned to Snape, Harry got a good look at the Flitwick, and he was appalled.  There were bruises everywhere, and where there weren't bruises there were bandages.  Harry thought Woodwalker seemed surprised by the fragility of his sudden burden – at any rate he was getting younger, and Harry hastened to help support the little Charms Professor in case the wizard from the past disappeared again.

Snape must have thought of that too, because he signalled Draco to help as well.  Just in time.  Woodwalker flickered for a moment and vanished.  A small boy with a brown braid and a Hufflepuff badge on his cloak stepped into his place.  "You need more badgers," the child observed solemnly, as he helped support the injured teacher.  "The ones in the walls are hiding."

"There are badgers in the _walls_?" Draco asked incredulously, adjusting his grip to ease his sore arm.  Harry was grateful for the Hufflepuff's help.  Draco was still a little green, to tell the truth, and with his hair disarrayed by the rain and wind, he looked oddly frail, like a bedraggled dandelion.

"Only some of them," the boy, who was getting taller rapidly, was undaunted by Draco's disbelief.  He craned his long neck to study the potion that Snape was tipping carefully into Flitwick's mouth.  He sniffed.  "Wouldn't that be better with a more concentrated solution of daisyroot?"

"Not in combination with this," Snape murmured, bringing out the second potion as Flitwick shuddered painfully and opened his eyes.  "Filius, what hurts?"

"All..." Flitwick said, holding himself quite still after that first uncontrolled movement.

"I've got HealWell salve," Snape said.  "We'll let the Restorus potion work for a minute, and we'll start with the worst of it," he promised while Draco counted out the seconds.  

"It works really well," Harry told the Charms professor, hoping to distract the small man while Snape stripped aside the nightshirt and bandages to reveal the damage. It was horrible.  "When we were outside, in the storm, it fixed Professor Snape right up. You'll feel a lot better soon."  As he lost height, Harry had to hold his arms higher, to keep Flitwick level.

"You're prattling, Potter," Snape pointed out, mildly for him.

"HealWell salve, HealWell salve," the Hufflepuff man said.  "But how did you get the unicorn liver?  Or did you use phoenix egg?"

"Someone had been killing unicorns," Snape said. "In the forest, for the blood.  The Groundskeeper frightened them off before they could eviscerate the last one."  Snape tipped a few drops of the second potion onto Flitwick's face, and the bruises and swelling faded.  "Given how seldom phoenixes lay eggs, Dumbledore gave me permission to use the liver."  As he spoke, he portioned out more of the careful drops.  Harry could see the lump of a misplaced rib move back into place.

"I remember that," Draco said, watching the effects of the potion with equal fascination.  "But won't using pieces of unicorn mean that the people who use the salve will be cursed?  For hurting a unicorn, I mean?"

            "It would," Snape said, absently, "were I in any way responsible for the death of the unicorn."  He peered at the vial, and then cast a grim glance around at the many beds.  "Hopefully, there will be enough of this to go around.  What else hurts, Filius?"

            "My back.  You'll have to tend it, Severus.  I shan't be able to dance, otherwise."  Flitwick said apologetically.  He sounded better than he had, though, and he was smiling.

            Harry replayed the last few bits of conversation in his head as they turned Flitwick so that Snape could attend to the damage on the back, trying not to think about how much less fragile Flitwick seemed on the healed half. Less like a bag of broken sticks.  He hadn't known that Dumbledore had found a way to use the dead unicorn.  And Fawkes was a boy phoenix, so he couldn't lay eggs, could he?   "Wait a minute.  Fawkes!  Can't we get Fawkes to heal  the people who are hurt?  At least some of them?"

            "Fawkes is dead," Professor Trelawney said, from just behind Harry's shoulder, and he had to keep himself from jumping.  "At least, for the moment.  But as the wizard, so the familiar, you know, so the bird should recover nicely once Albus does."

            "Hello, Sybill," Snape said.  "Your timing is, as usual, alarming.  Make yourself useful and get Filius something decent to wear, will you?"

            "Says the man who converses in freighted ellipses," Trelawney answered with a raised eyebrow.  "I've brought you a fresh robe, Filius.  I foresaw the need."

            "Thank you," Flitwick said.  He sounded much steadier now, if a little muffled by being held upside down.

            "Are divination spells working, then?" Snape asked.  "Charms aren't, at least not out there.  And I'm not entirely sure why potions are."

            "Because they were here already," said the Hufflepuff, who had gotten quite a bit older.  "Like clothes.  My clothes like to change with me. But yours stay the same and make you look silly."  He cocked his head, now crowned with an embroidered tea cosy, ignoring Snape's glare as he listened to something no one else could hear.  "I have to go now.  Hold tight."

            With the warning, Harry was just able to shift position enough to support Flitwick's head when the Hufflepuff vanished.  

            "It's all right, boys," Flitwick mumbled into Harry's shirt.  "I think I can stand on my own now."

            Draco and Harry put the Charms Professor down gently and stepped back to let Trelawney help him into the spare robes.  Snape went over to the bed, where McGonagall had taken the place of the wizard who had been at Dumbledore's head.

            "Who's going to hold Albus while we work?" he asked, nodding to the witch at the foot of the bed who nodded back and conceded her place to him before vanishing three steps away.  "Once we draw the circle, those within must be reliable."

            "I've been thinking about that," Professor Sprout said.  "And I believe it will have to be current students.  They vary the least.  Choose them from a year that we know hasn't graduated yet."

            McGonagall opened her eyes, looking straight to Harry.  "Mr. Potter and Mr. Malfoy have been consistent." she said. "Students from their year will suit the purpose."

            "I suggest Susan Bones to stand for Hufflepuff, then," said Sprout.  "She's steady, and stubborn and she knows how to dig in."  

            "And I," said Flitwick, climbing back onto the bed and tapping the shoulder of the witch who'd taken his place.  "ask that you fetch Lisa Turpin to hold my place for Ravenclaw.  Her natural curiosity will fix her to the task, no matter how strange."

            "I'll get them!  I'll get them!" cried Professor Trelawney, who was probably about twelve now, "I know just where they are!"  She turned and darted through the crowd towards the student tables with her skirts held high, caroling the girls' names for everyone to hear.

            "You truly don't need a loudspeaker with her about, do you?" offered a thin, bespectacled witch drily, and the kind of nervous laughter that interrupts a tense situation rippled through those close enough to hear her.

            Amid the brief splash of amusement, a short wizard with the face of an elderly chimpanzee and a long thin beard appeared near the corner of the bed.  Harry froze.  The last time he'd seen that face it had been on a giant statue in the Chamber of Secrets.  


	21. Lords and Ladies

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: 'Tisn't mine, 'tis true.  Thanks to Ozma for her Squib Doors (yes, you should go read her stories, now!—er, well, just as soon as you read mine, anyway), Ariana Deralte for her Uric the Oddball, and JKRowling who started it all... but especially Jinx, who believed that this chapter really needed to be worth the wait and made me work harder.

            Chapter 21: Lords and Ladies 

            Summary:  Weft, woof, shuttle and loom.

            ************

            "And who's to stand for Slytherin?" the new arrival rasped angrily.  The elder wizard's words echoed strangely, as if he were speaking in two languages at once, but his contemptuous tone was unmistakable.

            A pool of silence spread out as several wizards and witches stepped away from this apparition, making an empty space around the bed. Harry and Draco stepped back uncertainly as well, but the Hufflepuff man with the tea cosy hat was in the way, and a moment later the crowd had washed forward again into a loose ring to watch from a safer distance.  Even Flitwick and McGonagall and Sprout flinched, never quite losing their holds on Dumbledore, but shying away from the querulous old wizard, and hunching protectively over the unconscious Headmaster while exchanging grim, worried looks.  

            Snape alone hadn't moved.  He was still seated on the foot of the bed, his hand wire-taut atop Dumbledore's blanket covered feet, as if he were fighting the urge to cling tightly to the Headmaster for support.  Although he had lost no years, the Potions Professor looked strangely childlike, his black eyes huge in his pale face as he turned his head to look up at Salazar Slytherin.  After a very long moment, Snape moved with deliberate caution; keeping his right hand curled protectively over the Headmaster's feet, he rose from the bed to make a deep, formal bow to the Founder of his House.

The conversations of children who hadn't noticed the confrontation carried over the crowd's heads, but they sounded trivial, unreal.  Even Madam Pomfrey's voice, whispering something to the bed that made it rise so Snape could stand more comfortably upright while still holding on to the Headmaster, seemed muffled and distant.

            Snape's voice was soft, but it resonated in the cleared circle.   "Draco Malfoy will stand for Slytherin House, my lord."  

            Heads turned sharply to Draco, who looked like he'd swallowed a Snitch. He stiffened to attention as Salazar Slytherin poured a contemptuous eye over him, and shivered when the Founder frowned.  

"He's puny," Slytherin spat.  "And damaged," he added with a dismissive sniff.

            "He will rise to the task," Snape stated with steely certainty.  "Draco has mettle which oft goes unperceived."

            "But will he succeed?" Slytherin demanded.  "Will he stand to the test?"

            "I believe he can."  Snape's arms twitched, as if were stopping himself from folding them as emphatic punctuation.  Instead he gently readjusted his grip on Dumbledore's toes.  "Whether or not he _does, _will depend on him."

            "'Tis _you_ are recommending we depend on the runt," Slytherin said warningly.

            "So I am, my lord."  Some of the color and hauteur returned to Snape's face, and his black eyes glinted as he marked off his position.  

            Draco stepped forward, jerky as a marionette.  "I can do it, Sir!" he exclaimed, his cheeks flushed and his pointed chin held high, like a wooden copy of his father.

            "You don't even know what's to be done, you ignorant pup," Slytherin snapped.  "We could be asking you to chop your own head off."

            Draco went white and lost a year or two, but he swallowed hard and held still, like a rabbit which had espied a fox.  Only his gray eyes moved, looking to Snape.

            "Nothing so wasteful," the Potions Master assured his student, giving Slytherin a warning glare.

            The Founder returned it tenfold, glowering contemptuously at the current Head of House.  "But the task is still perilous.  You cannot deny the inherent risk," he challenged, grim and gloating.

            "Indeed I won't," Snape agreed with ice-glaze calm.  "The risk is immense...  But it is a risk to us all," he added with impatient precision.  "You understand that, else you would not be here.  I know what my students are capable of." He glanced briefly at the blond boy, who was fighting to regain years.  "Particularly when the stakes are so high.  Draco Malfoy will stand for our House.  He is my sole and unrivalled choice."

            "And I am supposed to trust your judgment?" Slytherin drawled witheringly, casting a cold glance at Snape's left arm.  His head shifted from side to side like a considering cobra.

            Snape bared his teeth in something that was not a smile.  "Yes," he insisted, "because _I_ am the one who returned."

            "Came crawling back to save your own skin, you mean," Slytherin accused with a wintry smile.

            Now Snape smiled back, briefly, easily.  " 'Survival is the only hope worth having'," he said evenly.  "Or am I misquoting you?"

            Slytherin went gray with rage.  "Listen, you arrogant swamp-get, you haven't – "

            "I _can_ do it!" Draco shouted suddenly, eleven years old and shrill as a steamkettle.  "I _will _do it!  My blood's as pure as yours!"  He started around the bed, as if to come to Snape's defense.

            The Founder turned on Draco, sneering when the boy froze beneath his basilisk stare.  "Yes, I can see that you descend from a long line of first cousins."  

            Draco's mouth fell open with a small squeak, like an outraged hinge, and he turned scarlet.

            "Think you're a champion, do you?  You're no more than a puling infant," Slytherin went on mercilessly.  "Rude, and unkempt, as well..."

            "You'd be unkempt too, if you'd been out in that storm!" Harry heard himself say, and felt as if he'd caught up with the words only once they were out of his mouth.   Nothing else for it.  He had to go on.  There wasn't time to just stand and listen. "We're not all going to die because no one's good enough for you."  He took two long strides, to bring himself up shoulder to shoulder with Draco. "Either you weren't here, or you weren't listening.  It has to be someone from _our_ time who stands for Slytherin.  Someone who won't vanish or run away.  Professor Snape _knows_ the students he has to choose among.  You don't.  So it's his choice, not yours."

The Potions Master stared as if Harry had suddenly started spouting Parseltongue.  The Founder looked Harry over, like a vulture examining an unusually unprepossessing heap of bones for remaining gristle, peering curiously at his scar before transferring his glittering gaze back to Draco.  "Who's your scruffy friend, boy?" he asked drily.

            Draco, fifteen again and sure of himself, snorted, "We're not _friends_." But he didn't step away from Harry.  "Merely allies.  For the moment.  Against _that_!"   He flung a dramatic hand towards the magic-devouring vortex near the ceiling.

            Slytherin didn't even glance upwards.  "Alliances with Gryffindor are a thankless business," he warned bitterly.

"Maybe that's true, and maybe it isn't," declared a deep voice from behind Harry.  A heavy hand fell on his shoulder, and he turned his head enough to see Godric Gryffindor smiling first at him and Draco, and then, almost fondly, at Slytherin.  "Come on, Sal," the red-haired Founder coaxed warmly.  "Time's a-wasting.  And you're the one who's always said that we must surpass ourselves in order to survive."

"And we've done that, love," said a buxom witch nearby, the badger cub nestled in her shawl grunting agreement.  Her blonde hair flowed down out of its bun and she grew younger and lovelier as she smiled at Slytherin, "Our dream is realized, Salazar.  But now it is the children who must preserve it."

            As Slytherin's eyes met hers, he grew younger as well, decades falling away to reveal the studious young man with the scholar's stoop.  He straightened haughtily, drawing his robes into order and granting a regal nod to Snape.  "Very well, House Master.  Your choice stands."

            "Thank you, my lord,"  Snape drew his own robes into order, somewhat handicapped by the need to keep one hand on Dumbledore, but the nod he returned to Slytherin was just as dignified.  Harry wondered if the Potions Master even knew that he had echoed the gesture.

            Slytherin looked now to Gryffindor.  "And what about you, Godric?  I suppose that insolent brat is your choice to defend the honor of that overcompensatory heap of rocks you call a tower?"

            Gryffindor laughed, low and rich.  "Well, he's bold enough, Sal."  He looked down to meet Harry's gaze, shaking the boy's shoulder gently.  "What say you, lad?  Will you stand for our House?"

Feeling as if he were about to drop into air for the most important Quidditch game of his life, Harry opened his mouth to say yes, and then hesitated and looked to Professor McGonagall where she sat cradling Dumbledore's head between her hands. "With all respect, Sir," he said carefully, "the decision isn't up to you; Professor McGonagall is Head of Gryffindor now." 

The small smile McGonagall gave him felt like a reward.  "I think you'll do just fine, Mr. Potter," she said, inclining her head respectfully to the Founder.  "Although I am pleased to know that my choice is uncontested.  Please forgive my not curtsying, my lord.  At the moment I'm quite sure that if I once got down, I should not be able to rise again."

            "Well, she wouldn't be the first lady to fall at your feet, Godric," laughed Helga Hufflepuff, as the growing brock clambered up onto her shoulder, "but really, there isn't time."

             "There'd be more time if the two of ye didn't insist on bangin' thy horns together in season and out," grumbled the black-haired witch who had taken Flitwick's place earlier, stepping between Slytherin and Gryffindor.  She nodded curtly to each of them and bestowed a more friendly look on Helga Hufflepuff as she walked over to stand behind the Charms teacher.  A large black raven circled down to caw informatively at her.  She smiled thanks at the bird and turned to peer over the varying heights of the milling crowd.  "Here they come."

            The throng rippled apart, revealing Susan Bones, who was leading Lisa Turpin by the hand as they threaded past teachers and students.  Susan picked up speed as they crossed the cleared space, giving only brief, curious glances to the gathered Founders as she brought her companion to stand obediently before the current Head of Hufflepuff.  "Professor Trelawney said you asked for us, Professor Sprout."

            "So I did, child."  Sprout drew Susan to her and scooted Lisa towards Flitwick.

            "Come closer, bairn," Rowena Ravenclaw beckoned.

            Lisa, momentarily eleven, stared up at her with undisguised curiosity.  "Why do I hear you talk twice?" 

            Ravenclaw smiled and ruffled Lisa's hair with gentle approval.  "And wi' our students comin' from every pocket kingdom on these isles, how else are we to be kenned, but wi' a spell?  Now, my child, come ye nigh the bed."

            "Excuse me," Susan asked, keeping her attention stubbornly fixed on Professor Sprout.  "But why did you want us?"

            "There's work to be done," Helga Hufflepuff said, coming to the girl.  At Sprout's nod, Susan allowed herself to be turned to face the Founder.  Her eyes widened when the badger sniffed at her face and began to chuckle _nikinikiniki_ at her, but she withstood the scrutiny calmly and held up a hand to be snuffled.  "You'll do," Hufflepuff chuckled after a moment, and a small smile flickered across Susan's face at the approval.

            Gryffindor steered Harry over to McGonagall.  Draco stalked around the end of the bed to Snape, being careful to keep the Potions Master between himself and Salazar Slytherin. But he performed a precise bow to the Founder, to which Slytherin nodded  imperiously in return.  

In a few moments Founders, Heads of House, and chosen students had arranged themselves so that each House held one edge of the Headmaster's bed.  McGonagall cleared her throat.  "Well, Verna," she said to Sprout, taking undisputed charge of the gathering as Deputy Headmistress.  "You've had the most time of any of us to consider the matter."  She looked seriously down at Dumbledore's drawn face, still cradled between her hands. "How bad is it?"

            "Bad enough." Sprout said somberly.  "We're going to have to use the Summons Home."

            The ripple of awed, worried agreement that ran through the adults gathered around the bed stopped at Snape, who stared at his colleagues in something like horror.  "That's a cure or kill spell," he protested.  "Surely, if we were to use the Hands of Four, he would recover enough for the use of healing potions."  He didn't sound confident, and his age was slipping downwards.  

            Harry couldn't blame him.  Dumbledore looked awful, like a waxwork that had been left in the summer sun.  There was a strange sheen to his skin, and he was shrinking somehow.  _Melting._  "Couldn't you do both?" Harry blurted out, growing smaller.  "He's really --" He couldn't finish the thought. He took hold of the blanket and tugged it straight as he tried to hide his dismay.  "Will a spell be enough?  I mean -- charms aren't working very well."

            "Waving a wand is but the simplest way of casting spells, child," Flitwick said, with authority.  "There are other methods, more difficult, and more certain.  You'll study them in time."  The Charms Master turned to the Potions Master. "Severus, it _must_ be the Summons Home.  Can you not feel it?" 

Snape frowned and studied the imperiled Headmaster, then lifted his head as if searching or scenting the air.  Long moments passed before he met Flitwick's gaze and conceded with a reluctant bob of the head.  "It will turn out right," Flitwick reassured him gently.  "This is Albus.  I doubt he's gone so far that Hogwarts is no longer his home."

            "If it's the Summons Home you've chosen, you'd best cast it at the Center," Slytherin said peremptorily.  "Bring the bed."  He drew his wand, held it out like a dowsing rod, and started off down the hall.  People scattered hastily out of his way, and the murmur of conversations rippled outwards through the congregation as word of what was happening was passed along.

            "Go on then, push," Helga Hufflepuff ordered cheerfully, taking one of the corner bedposts.  "Salazar's generally right about positioning pattern magic.  He's very good at finding the strongest flow."

            "Nice to know someone thinks Slytherins are good for something," a young Draco muttered resentfully as he tried to get a grip on the bed with his good arm.

            "Never said they weren't," Godric Gryffindor said, bending to the task of moving the bed.  "Hogwarts without Slytherin House would be a three-legged cow, indeed."

            "A three-legged cow?" Susan echoed uncertainly.

            "Of limited usefulness and damn difficult to defend," huffed Rowena Ravenclaw.  "And as hard to shift as this bed.  Go _left_, Godric!"

            "Your left or my left?" Gryffindor grunted as the bed swung like a rusty pendulum.  Draco and Snape scrambled to swing it back the other way with difficulty; Draco was no more than thirteen, and Snape was going younger.  He looked like his leg was starting to bother him, too.

            "It might be easier to move the bed," Draco grumbled, glaring at the three teachers still riding along with the Headmaster, "if there were only _one_ person on it."  

            "We must not lose the balance, Mr. Malfoy," McGonagall said.  "We must hold on."

            "Well, hold on and _push_, then!"

Harry thought about that.  McGonagall was hurt, Sprout looked about twelve, and Flitwick... well, _Snape_ was having trouble hanging on to Dumbledore and pushing, and he was the tallest of the Heads of House.  Flitwick could never manage it.  And with only two people on Slytherin's side, it would be even more out of balance if the other Heads of House started pushing on their sides.  

            "What we need," Harry decided, "is more people to help push." 

            "Done!" cried a red-haired boy with a Gryffindor scarf who had been a tall balding man moments before.  He all but leapt out of the watching crowd, as if he'd been waiting for a chance to serve.  "Martin Weasley, at your service," he announced with a grand gesture.   "You lot, climb aboard!  There are plenty of _us_ to do the work.  Weasleys!  To me!"

            It was a little like being in Ron's room, surrounded by orange and black Chudley Cannons posters, except that now the black was Hogwarts robes and the orange was all on the tops of the heads of the dozens of wizards and witches who answered the call.  They came in every size, like matrioska dolls with painted smiles, chattering happily as they swarmed the bed and began to push.  

Madam Pomfrey hastily persuaded the bed to grow larger and Susan and Lisa clambered up, like Gryffindor and Hufflepuff, needing no help. McGonagall freed one hand to steady Harry as Ron boosted him up beside her.  Rowena Ravenclaw was gallantly helped aboard by a young, slender Arthur Weasley and someone who looked like a twin but was wearing fourteenth century robes.  Draco yelped and clutched his bad arm as he got a lift from Percy.  And Snape was so startled to be seized from behind by Fred and George and deposited unceremoniously on the bed that he slipped down to a first year and let go of the Headmaster.   

Dumbledore shuddered, deep wracking convulsions that hurt just to watch, and the other three teachers cried out wordlessly.  Draco caught Snape's hands and ruthlessly clamped them around Dumbledore's feet.  Bewildered, the younger boy tried to pull away again, and McGonagall snapped out like a blade, "_Mr. Snape_!   Hold on and _concentrate_!"

            The greasy-haired child scowled, and his shoulders hunched up angrily, but his age started up again and he stopped resisting Draco.  The blond boy, no more than thirteen himself, said testily, "Just hang on.  You _have_ to.  It's important."  He shot a glare at McGonagall.  "Not that I know _why._"

            "Professor Dumbledore is the keystone," Sprout explained in professorial tones.  "As each Headmaster has been in turn.  Once healed, he might be able to keep the castle from shaking itself apart."  

            The five students on the bed stared at her.

            "Might?" Draco said with disbelief.  "Only _might_?"

            "Without him, we've no chance at all, Mr. Malfoy," Flitwick said sternly.  

            "Oh."  Draco's voice cracked and he swallowed hard.  He patted Snape's shoulder, losing years as the Potions Master blinked older, coming at last to the age of understanding.  "All right now, Professor?" the blond boy asked, taking the young man's startled, curt nod as agreement.

            A shadow from above distracted Harry and he looked up in time to see Tom Riddle hovering on a broom, scowling down at the bed.  The Slytherin Prefect was so absorbed in his scrutiny of Dumbledore that he wasn't paying attention to the swirling menace descending from the ceiling.  The greedy whorl was going to go right through him on its way to the bed.

Before Harry could think to warn Riddle, Angelina Johnson swooped into view, holding a singing jack-o-lantern snugged like a Quaffle under one arm.  "Watch it!" she cried, kicking Riddle's broom into a distancing spin as if he were a troublesome Chaser. Her robes brushed the tops of the bedposts as she barrel-rolled into position and hurled the pumpkin into the maelstrom, forcing it back towards the ceiling.

            Harry barely noticed the shouts of congratulations and thanks from the spectators nearest the bed.  His eyes followed Tom Riddle, who fought his broom to a stop and spun around to glare at Angelina.  For a fraction of a second, Harry thought he saw the Prefect's features alter -- his eyes flashed red, and his features shrank into the twisted mask of Voldemort.

            Harry's scar flared with pain.  He was on the bed and above the bed. Two images of the Great Hall danced in front of him, and when he closed his eyes, only one of them vanished.  From thirty feet high he found himself looking down, witnessing the ghostly, ghastly appearance of masks on dozens of faces in the milling crowd.  _So many... everywhere...  _The masks grew whiter, brighter, blinding him and obscuring the identities of their wearers.  There was one of them near Dumbledore, too near! Harry snapped his eyes open in fright, and found himself jerked back to his own body, looking up at Voldemort's cloaked figure on the broom.

            And then the Dark Lord vanished,  the broom falling harmlessly into the hands of a waiting Ravenclaw Prefect, who mounted it in a businesslike way and headed down to where Filch was handing out enchanted objects.

            "Brilliant!" Ron cheered near Harry's ear.  "Go Angelina!"  He was grinning.  He hadn't noticed Voldemort.  In fact, no one else seemed to have noticed, either.  "Was that pumpkin singing Christmas Carols?" Ron wondered cheerfully as he bent to push against the bed again.

            "Yes," sighed Professor Sprout wistfully.  "I never did get that enchantment right."  

            One part of Harry's mind wondered how the pumpkin had ended up confiscated by Filch or one of his predecessors, but he had to find the Death Eater he'd seen through Voldemort's eyes, the one that had got so close to Dumbledore.  

_Maybe it was Snape that I saw.  The Potions Master was still aging -- he had his left arm tucked against him as if it ached again – but he wasn't looking around the way Harry thought he should be, if he'd noticed Voldemort._

Besides, Harry had thought that the white mask was _near_ the bed, not on it.  But it was all Weasleys around the bed.  Now that he was taking the time to look at them properly he could see that not all of them had red hair, but the family resemblances were unmistakable.  They wore the scarves and badges of every House, including Slytherin, but they worked together with only friendly familial squabbling. Percy had his Prefect badge displayed prominently, and was watching for the return of the whirlwind, calling instructions about avoiding it, which the other Weasleys cheerfully ignored.  Martin and Arthur and a curly haired woman were shouting directions too and the fact that they were contradicting one another bothered them not a whit.

            Harry looked up again.  There were five or six flyers lurking near the ceiling, some of them in archaic Quidditch robes, holding objects ready to throw at the next resurgence of the magical vortex.  Of Voldemort there was no sign.  Harry hoped that Professor Lupin and Sirius Black were old enough to remember to watch Quirrell.

            And _there to watch Quirrell.  If Quirrell was even there at all.  Harry got up on his knees, using Ron's shoulders to steady himself as he looked out over the heads of the Weasleys to study the hall.  It was quite dizzying, watching people age and youthen and vanish altogether now and then.  And there were so many _people_.  Looking hard, Harry recognized only a few faces from among them.  That was Cornelius Fudge, pompous even at thirteen, and that was Mr. Ollivander, old as stones as he rose from a bench, only to vanish and reappear as a small, scrawny first year in an outsized robe._

            Hermione and the other researchers were busily pushing book-laden tables out of the way.  Harry craned his neck and glimpsed his mother again, tall and lovely, smiling at two black-haired toddlers who were neatly penned in by stacks of tomes.

            He didn't see Quirrell, though.  Or Voldemort.  And his scar didn't hurt now.

            "See anything exciting, Harry?" Ron asked.  

            "I thought I had," Harry answered as he turned his head full circle one last time.  "But he's gone now."  He sat down again, and met McGonagall's questioning look with a small shrug.  

            "Clear this space!" Slytherin's voice commanded from nearby.  A quarter of the Weasleys ebbed from the bed to start helping push aside tables, which improved the view of the Founder, who was casting around with his wand, testing several flagstones before settling on one of them. "This is the center," he pronounced, marking the spot with a spark that scorched the floor.  He directed the remaining bed-bearers to the place and instructed them when to stop.  "That will do.  But you've got him oriented the wrong way," he reprimanded Flitwick sternly.

            "A matter of expedience, my lord.  When I was injured I fit better on the bed this way," Flitwick said agreeably.  "You're quite right, of course - Ravenclaw should stand at his head.  Turn the bed one quarter-turn to the left, please," he addressed the company,  "and we shall rearrange ourselves."  

            "Do as I do, Mr. Potter," McGonagall advised.  She turned to Gryffindor, who looked ancient, silver haired and frail.  The two haggard adults helped each other off the bed, a process made more difficult by McGonagall's need to keep one hand always on Dumbledore.  Harry felt very young as he hopped down between them.  He grew, though, to take the weight of a hand on either shoulder as the parade of Founders, teachers and students shuffled awkwardly around the corners of the bed, trailing their fingers along the Headmaster's silent form all the way.  Only Flitwick remained on the bed, picking his way very carefully as Madam Pomfrey convinced the bed to shrink until it was no wider or longer than a cot.  

            _Or a bier.  _

Awful thought.  Harry clutched at Dumbledore's sleeve, and then made his fingers relax when he felt the warmth of the arm inside it._ He's still warm.  He's still alive.  _ The bad shape just made it easier to reach the Headmaster now, that was all.  Still, now that Harry was touching Dumbledore he didn't really want to let go.

            "What do we do now?" Susan Bones asked, holding a fistful of blanket near Dumbledore's feet.

            Flitwick took out his wand.  "You four students will hold the Headmaster in balance while we four teachers work our spell."

            "And the four of _us will stand back and let you work," sighed Helga Hufflepuff, now a plump crone and pale as candlewax.  "It's all I can do not to fade away, much less attempt spellwork.  We'd throw the circle out of true, were we within it."  She nodded to the other Founders, and they stepped back, carrying the tide of Weasleys along with them and clearing a large space around the bed that was empty of everyone but its eight attendants._

            And Ron, who still held one of the corner posts and studied McGonagall uncertainly.  "But, Professor, Harry... and Malfoy... they've had a hard day of it.  Shouldn't someone else take their places?  I'll do it, if you like."  His head cocked to one side a little as he looked at Harry.  "Sorry, Harry, but you look like a bludger caught up to you."  Draco laughed and Ron glared at him.  "So do you, Malfoy.  Two bludgers."

            Draco scowled.  "We've done all this _already_.  We're chosen, you're not. That's all there is to it.  Get lost, Weasley."

            "We're all right, Ron," Harry said, smiling as best he could at his best friend, and almost certain that he was telling the truth.  "Thanks anyway."

            Ron looked down at Harry and then patted his shoulder with a sad smile.  "You always get stuck holding the baby," he said, his voice cracking as he gained another year.  "And I'm always the one who has to wait."

            "At least I always know that someone's waiting," Harry's own voice shook a bit, and he swallowed hard.  "It's not like the Dursleys would care.  But we have to get started.  Go on, Ron.  Get somewhere with a good view – find Hermione – she'll have got a good spot so she can take notes."

            "Maybe she'll lend them to me," Lisa said tightly, as Ron nodded and stepped back into the crowd.  "I've only ever _read about pattern magic.  It's very complicated.  And I still don't know exactly what we're meant to be doing."_

            "Nor do any of us," Snape muttered under his breath as he shifted his chain mail and twitched his cloak into order.  "That's how it works," he added in a mocking, unhappy sing-song, as if he were quoting an inadequate text.

            "Don't fret, Severus," soothed Flitwick amiably, placing Lisa's hands on either side of Dumbledore's face. "You'll know the words as you need them.  They are in your heart."  Smiling confidently up at Snape's queasy scowl, the tiny Charms teacher went to the corner of the bed and slid down the bedpost.  He raised his wand in jaunty salute and walked away.  Near the edge of the cleared area, he touched the tip of his wand to the worn flagstones and proceeded deosil, leaving a pale line that looked like chalk behind him.  

As Flitwick passed between the bed and Rowena Ravenclaw she stood straighter and taller and called out in that language that wasn't English, and this time there was no echoing translation.  He went on, past Gryffindor and Hufflepuff and Slytherin, and each of them called out too, although Slytherin's words were different.  Whatever they'd said, it meant something, for wizards and witches moved forward at their beckoning, and displaced the Weasleys.  The Founders nodded to the people they called, and they all formed a broad circle just outside of Flitwick's line of chalk.  

Harry recognized Woodwalker standing near Helga Hufflepuff; everyone in her quarter of the circle seemed to have something of the gardens about them.  Beside Slytherin stood haughty wizards and witches, silver serpents wound through the patterns of their robes.  Rowena Ravenclaw had gathered to her side more witches than wizards, ink-stained hands and spectacles as common as grass among them and gazes drifting hungrily towards the tables full of books.  

            Strangely, there were fewer witches and wizards standing with Gryffindor, stretching out their arms to fill the space along the chalkline.  They shared a spark of laughter between them as Neville Longbottom pushed forward to the front with a tray full of sandwiches and a face full of confusion.  He looked up at Godric Gryffindor, offering the tray and saying something, but Harry couldn't hear him properly;  Flitwick had finished the circle and all of the sounds from beyond it were as distant as dreaming.

The current Head of Ravenclaw returned to the bed, and nodded solemnly up at his colleagues.  "Ladies, Severus," he invited.  As McGonagall stepped back Harry brought up his other hand to cover Dumbledore's fingers.  The skin was warm where McGonagall had been holding it, cooler where her hand hadn't reached, dry and soft as aged parchment.  Draco held Dumbledore's other hand, looking rather startled.  

"Skin against skin will work best," Sprout tugged away the covers so that Susan could take hold of Dumbledore's feet.  "Get a good grip, dear.  He's ticklish."  She rolled the covers up and tucked them under the bed entirely while Flitwick went round examining each child's grip upon the sleeping man and murmuring approval.

"Don't forget, children," he instructed somberly, "whatever happens, do not let the Headmaster leave your grasp until our healing spell is complete."

            Harry nodded, and exchanged glances with Draco, Susan and Lisa.  They all looked as nervous as he was.  "Is that all we have to do?" Draco asked,  "Just hold on?"  Harry was grateful that someone had voiced the question.   Holding on didn't seem like much of a help.  He'd been expecting to have to chant incantations or something complicated.

            "That will be more than enough," Snape said drily.  He'd moved back so that he was halfway between the bed and Salazar Slytherin's place at the edge of the circle, directly behind Draco and opposite Harry.  

            "Are we ready, then?"  Flitwick asked.  "Everyone in place?"

            "Except for you," Snape's voice lacked its usual acidity.  The Potions Master closed his eyes and stood straighter, drawing his wand and holding it out at shoulder height, both arms extended, the wand held lightly in one hand with its tip resting in the palm of his other hand.  Harry glanced left and right, and saw that Sprout, who had settled into a comfortable stance several feet behind Susan, and Flitwick, who had taken his position behind Lisa, were holding the same pose.  Sprout nodded to Flitwick, and behind him, Harry heard McGonagall assent to the unspoken question.

            "_Aedicula me insurgere!" _  The four Heads of House commanded in unison.  As they spoke the incantation, the air above their hands changed, as if it were being transfigured, folding in and in and in again on itself like an origami paper gone wild.  Snape reached into the tumultuous air with his free hand and came away grasping a goblet of green glass.  Sprout held a coin of gold, Flitwick a second wand of bright ivory.  Harry risked a glance over his shoulder.  McGonagall was holding a sword of beaten steel upright, as if it weighed no more than the wand in her other hand.

            And then, to Harry's astonishment, Flitwick began to sing, in a clear high tenor.  His words were doubled, echoing strangely as the Founders' words had, but under and through the strange syllables threaded the meaning.

_            "To fly in your light, I would cross a thousand oceans..."  _

A breeze sprang up, swirling joyously around the bed.  Under Harry's hand, Dumbledore took a deep breath.

            McGonagall's surprisingly sweet voice rang out, _"To bathe in your truth, I would walk the world round..."   _

Warmth spread through the circle, and color rose in the sleeping man's cheeks.

            Then Sprout sang, alto to McGonagall's soprano, _"To gaze upon your face I would climb the highest mountain..."   _

            Scent of roses, and the muck the roses grew best in -- Dumbledore turned his head a little, eyes closed, as if to smell it better.

            Snape's gruff baritone gained in strength and certainty with each word. _"To be still in your grace, I would change all that I am."    _

Sweat beaded on the Headmaster's forehead, as if a fever had broken, and his hand grew damp in Harry's.

            Draco's eyebrows looked as high as Harry's felt.  He was staring past Harry at McGonagall.  Lisa and Susan looked shocked too.    

            Snape suddenly took a step forward, his wand swinging wide, the tip trailing a line of luminous aquamarine that spiralled upwards as he spun and paced sunwise.  All four teachers were moving now, _dancing, treading paths interwoven as they swirled past each other and around the circle.  Each wand trailed a ribbon of colored light that rose into the air; amber, scarlet, aquamarine, and cerulean interlaced like Maypole ribbons._

_            "Stay with me," Flitwick and McGonagall sang high and clear, their notes searching, shimmering like heat haze._

_"Stay with me," Sprout and Snape echoed on the heels of the phrase, their deeper voices summoning, drawing like earth and tide.  _

_"Walk with me," exhorted the first two._

_"Walk with me," the low echo returned._

And then, all four voices together, blending, entreating,. "_With your hand on my shoulder...."_

            Dumbledore gasped and writhed, and Harry wrenched his attention away from the dancers as the song continued.

_            "Here with you,"        _

_                        "Here with you"_

_            "I mean to stay;"_

_                        "I mean to stay;"_

_            The voices reunited. __"We choose to love and live this day."  It was a promise, sung in a harmony that was sweet and good.  For a step or two of the dance, the four teachers were all facing inwards, their unified melody strong and commanding. __"Stay with me."  _

            And Dumbledore _changed!  One moment he was himself, the next he was shifting, twisting, his skin bubbling out and growing slimy as he transformed into a huge eel with baleful eyes and a mouthful of needles.  It was at least twenty feet long; its coils twisting back and around, but never over the edge of the bed.  Harry pressed back against the cold fishflesh, wondering if the spell had gone awry._

            "Tam Lin!" Lisa Turpin exclaimed, letting it sink those wicked teeth into her left hand.  Tears sprang to her eyes, but she wrapped her other hand over the predatory snout.  "Hold on tight!"

            "Like you've got a choice!" Draco exclaimed.  He'd stopped himself from flinching away, the same as Harry had, and now he spread his hands against the eel's side.  "You're not getting rid of us that easily, old man."   

            Susan nodded from her end of the bed.  "We've got him, Lisa," she reassured her friend.

            Would talking make things worse?  Harry looked around him.  Flitwick had begun a second verse of the song, and all four of the Heads of House were moving in their patterns again.  The tune skipped from teacher to teacher and above them a glittering fretwork of light glowed lacily, forming gradually into a dome shape over the bed as they continued their intermingling dance..  Small flickering shavings of neon-bright light escaped from the curling ribbons of the spell, falling softly down like confetti onto the children and the eel.  They didn't last, or tingle, or hurt, and Harry decided not to worry about them.

Beyond the circle, Harry was vaguely aware that the Founders and their chosen wizards and witches were holding the line, singing the chorus in counterpoint to the verse.  Above them, he thought he could hear the cries of the people on the brooms, dealing with the intermittent appearances of the whirlwind.  Beneath him, the castle trembled.

            The eel shrivelled inward and changed shape, turning back into Dumbledore.  Lisa sobbed with relief as her hand was freed.  But as the song went into another verse Dumbledore's hair began to grow soft red-brown, and he started shrinking further and further in from the edges of the bed. For a moment Harry thought that the Headmaster was finally growing younger.  But then he felt Dumbledore's bones modifying grotesquely inside his skin. "Hang on!" Harry cried, as claws raked his palm.  The man changed into a fox, nearly flirting his tail free of Susan's grasp.  She sprawled forward onto the bed with a yelp, but she didn't let go of that teasing red flag.  Harry dug his fingers into the lush red fur with his right hand and caught her sleeve, pulling her up onto the bed with his left.   Draco was helping Lisa, who still had her grip on one of the fox's ears.

_It's going to keep happening.  He's going to keep changing.  Harry tried to think ahead as the chorus ended and Dumbledore returned once again to his own self. _ I don't think he can get bigger than the bed.  _"If he goes even smaller than a fox, keep at least one hand on him," he commanded.  "Box him in!"_

            "How small could he go?" Draco asked, taking advantage of the momentarily safe shape to scramble half onto the bed. Harry did the same.

            "He can't be anything we can't hold," said Susan.  "Can he?"

            "I think we're about to find out," Lisa said, as the song swung into still another chorus and Dumbledore trembled under their hands and began to dwindle into a glimmer of honey-gold.

            "Snitch?" Harry wondered.

            "Bee!"  Draco countered.

            In a fumble of sweaty hands the four of them managed to follow the transfiguration down and forward.  Wings whirred against Harry's palm, and he felt something that might be a stinger scrape past the sore clawmarks.  He clamped his other hand over the first as insurance.  "Stay with me!" he tried to sing with the teachers, hoping it would help.

            He spared a glance for the dancers, and the pattern of light.  He saw Snape growing younger; stumbling as he reached his early twenties; and then recovering onto his injured leg and growing rapidly older again. The stumble shook his wand, snarling the trail of light, and Harry despaired, but when Sprout twirled into the place Snape had left, she drew the same snarl into her line, and so did McGonagall and Flitwick.  Now Harry noticed other bobbles and curlicues in the lines already interwoven, each peculiarity meticulously replicated in every color.

            "What else can he turn into?" Susan asked, and Harry concentrated on Dumbledore as the song wound round into another chorus.

            "Tam Lin turned into a block of ice," Lisa said grimly, tears streaking her face.  "And a bar of red hot steel."

            "Don't give him any ideas!" Draco protested, as the bee expanded and changed, and they had to adjust their positions on the edges of the bed.  For the pause between chorus and verse, Dumbledore was himself again.  Then the color began to drain out of him, even out of his nightrobe, as he became a statue of transparent ice.  

            _Not ice.  Glass.  The smoothness under Harry's hands was warm, not cool.  A bloom of red lingered at the Headmaster's heart.  For a breath and a half, Harry hoped that this would be an easy transformation. The Headmaster's face shimmered, refracting his own heart's light and reflecting the glow of the spell-threads above him.  His mouth opened, although he did not speak and his eyes stayed closed. _

            And then the heartbloom of red brightened to yellow and then to white, and the smooth translucent skin began to burn against Harry's palm.  Harry withdrew one hand, meaning to spit on his fingertips before he placed them back again, the way he might protect himself a little from a hot pan on a stove. 

            The glass began to melt like taffy over his other hand.  Harry was too startled to pull away – it hurt almost too much to feel the pain, as if whatever nerves were there to feel with were being burnt away.  Draco was screaming, but he hadn't moved back – he couldn't, his hands were caught fast.  Susan was holding on with her hands somehow clenched _inside_ the glass,  and blood starting to drip from the lip she'd bitten through.  Lisa was the only one who had managed to pull away. Dumbledore shuddered and she quickly pressed forward again, her tears falling to sizzle against spun-sugar strands of glass hair.  

Harry stared at the statue.  Fractures were forming in the glass, running instantly out from the hot center, bringing red light and heat with them in thin lines and broad, dividing and dividing again, like blood vessels into capillaries.  They spread like branched blades, demarcating the injured man into a million pieces that might momentarily fly apart.  Harry grimaced and put down his other hand, trying not to breathe in the smell of burning meat.  

The crazing of the glass slowed, and Harry made himself look up so he didn't have to watch his hands burn.  He stared at the colored lights, listening to the pounding of his pulse inside his ears.  It kept rhythm with the throb of the pain and the music.

            There were more voices singing now.  It wasn't just the teachers, or the adults who had joined the Founders. There were children's voices, some of them cracking their way from note to note as the song wove down through a massive chorus.  The words echoed in the great hall like lightning, like thunder; the air shook with their commanding plea.

**            _"STAY WITH ME!"_**

Snape, McGonagall, Sprout and Flitwick spun back into their original places and poses, attaching the lightstrands to the symbols they carried.  The bound-off threads of light floated up into the spellweb overhead and deftly wove themselves into the edges, the symbols becoming ethereal as they hung like bracelet charms at each of the cardinal points.  And then the whole thing began to sink rapidly towards the bed, curling its skirts under itself like a jellyfish.  Harry shuddered as the energies collapsed icily right through him and the other three, to wrap tightly around Dumbledore.

            The pain ended.

            There was silence.  

Harry blinked the afterimage of the light-ribbons away.  It seemed dim now in the Great Hall with only the light from the torches on the walls.  No one was moving.  No one was saying anything.  Was the spell finished?  Carefully, Harry let himself look down at the Headmaster.

            Dumbledore was resting on the bed, flesh and blood once more.  Harry still waited, afraid to let go.  A tear ran cool down his cheek and his neck and he knew it hadn't been the first.  Across from him, Draco's cheeks were tear-tracked too, and the Slytherin boy was breathing hard.  So was Harry, come to think of it, as hard if he'd tried to run up all the flights of stairs to Gryffindor.  Lisa's eyes were huge in her small face, and every freckle stood out on the back of Susan's hands.

            _Susan has hands.  _

With that realization, Harry dared look at the ends of his own arms.  The barked knuckle he'd got from a tree in the forest was healing, and a deep scratch had become no more than a thin scar.  Cautiously, keeping the back of his hand pressed against Dumbledore, he turned one palm up to look at it. The dark charred flesh was healing.  Charcoal bits fell away, leaving skin that was puffy and red one moment, flat  and white the next, and then... then somehow the burns were gone. The blisters he'd got from the rope at the edge of the world appeared, only to heal in an eyeblink, their scars fading as he watched.  The scrapes from the foxclaws barely showed up at all before they vanished, and other small scars were getting harder to see.  He wondered if the scar on his forehead had faded too; when he touched it, would the familiar ridge still be in place?

            McGonagall's trembling hand on his shoulder brought him out of his thoughts.  He saw Snape take Draco's shoulder and gently move him a half-step to one side, freeing a space to lay his other hand shakily against the Headmaster's arm. McGonagall was tugging at Harry, too, making space for herself.  He made himself step aside, but her hand closed next to his on Dumbledore's hand, and the hand she held on his shoulder kept him from leaving.  

            Dumbledore's chest moved slowly, as if he were sleeping.

            Professor Flitwick scrambled wearily onto the bed next to Lisa, using one of her shoulders for support as he cupped a hand against Dumbledore's cheek.  Susan gave way to Sprout, steadying the Herbology professor when she staggered.  Their hands overlapped on the sleeping man's bare feet.

            McGonagall leaned forward.  "Headmaster?" she said hoarsely.  "Albus?"

            Dumbledore's eyes opened and he turned sleepily to look at each of the four who had danced for him, and the students who stood nervously beside them. "I heard you calling," he said at last, with a curious smile, and Harry's heart flipped with joy, for the Headmaster's voice was strong and sure.  "Have I missed anything important?"

******

The teachers' song is from Ghostland's album Interview with the Angel.  It's called, "In Your Light," and is Thanks to Jinx, who, when I described my idea, said, "I know the song."   I _think I have the lyrics right, but I'm not entirely sure._

To fly in your light, I would cross a thousand oceans.

To bathe in your truth I would walk the world round

To gaze on your face I would climb the highest mountain

To be still in your grace I would change all that I am.

Stay with me.  Walk with me.  With your hand on my shoulder.

Here with you I mean to stay   we choose to love, and live this day.

Stay with me.

In the shade of your heart I would rest forever easy

In the palm of your hand I would sleep in dreamless peace

Stay with me.  Walk with me.  With your hand on my shoulder.

Here with you I need to stay we choose to love and live this day

Stay with me.

repeat

The Latin spell means "raise my house" if I've done it right.  If I haven't I have no idea what it means.


	22. Simple Gifts

            Balance: by rabbit

            Disclaimer: 'Tisn't mine, 'tis true.  Thanks to Ozma for letting me borrow her view of Filch, Ariana Deralte for her Uric the Oddball, and JKRowling who started it all... but especially Jinx, who is patient but encouraging when I've gotten stuck.  Elsie Piddock belongs to Eleanor Farjeon. (bonus points to anyone who spots her!) Special thanks to VJM for Scotspicking Rowena's lines.

            Chapter 22: Simple Gifts 

            Summary:   By turning, turning we come out right.

            ************

            A high, piping trill from the dais cut through the silence, and every head turned toward that sweet, clear sound.  Flames leapt up suddenly from one of the small cots and from the fiery fountain of sparks Fawkes appeared, singing with glee as he launched himself into the air.  Dumbledore smiled and sat up, offering an arm as perch. The phoenix, who after a long spiral, alighted gracefully, sidling along towards the Headmaster's elbow where it could reach up to nip affectionately at Dumbledore's beard.  "Hullo," he said fondly.  "You're looking well, if a bit blurry."  Skritching the bird under the chin with one finger, he turned his gaze to the room..  "Has anyone seen my glasses?"

            "I think I have them, sir," Poppy Pomfrey, about fourteen just now, pushed her way past Professor Sprout and extracted an assortment of glasses from the deep pockets of her apron.  She waited fiddled with the tangle for a moment and then held the lot out nervously while Dumbledore selected his own pair.  

            He found them at once and perched them onto his crooked nose.  "Thank you, my dear," Dumbledore smiled.  His eyebrows rose as the girl aged swiftly into the woman before his eyes.  "Thank you indeed."   He rose to his feet, balancing Fawkes still, and turned slowly, surveying the room.  Harry looked around too, wondering whether the dance had changed anything but Dumbledore.

            The ring of people the Founders had created was fuller now, more balanced between the houses. A dozen or more Gryffindors had appeared in their quarter, but the other three houses had new representatives too.   Harry recognized Headmaster Dippet standing among the Hufflepuffs.   With that clue, he looked again.  All of the newest arrivals were people he'd seen in portraits in Dumbledore's office – former Headmasters.  Had they only been able to appear once Dumbledore was awake, then?

The Founders themselves stood at the cardinal points.  They were as young as Harry had seen them; only Rowena Ravenclaw looked to be older than twenty-five.  As Dumbledore made his bows to them they bowed or curtsied in return. 

            "I had no idea it was a party," Dumbledore said with a twinkle in his eye.  He  sketched a sigil in the air and his nightshirt transformed into feast-worthy robes.  A sigh ran through the watching crowd, as if everyone had been waiting to see that Dumbledore's puissance was intact. 

            "WATCH IT!"  A gruff shout interrupted the tension. Harry looked up.  A lone flyer, clad in Hufflepuff Quidditch robes, had stuck to the task of watching for the descent of the magic devouring whirlwind.  He swooped low to intercept its probing tentacle with a writhing bit of rug.  The scrap of cloth tried to dodge, but the whirlwind twisted left and absorbed it, flickering with colors of the fabric before it vanished.  

            "Well," said Dumbledore, matter-of-factly. "We'll have to do something about that."  He shooed the headmasters and four students to one side, banishing the bed with a flick of his wand so that he could stand on the spot that Slytherin had marked as the center.  Then he looked up decisively. "Argus!  Argus Filch!" he called and the Caretaker of Hogwarts was ushered forward into the cleared circle by the bed.

            "Yes, Headmaster Dumbledore?"  Filch, as old and crusty as Harry had always known him, clumped stolidly into the cleared space, shoulders hunched as if that were all the defense he needed against the whirlwind dropping down on him.   He looked strange, and it took a moment for Harry to realize why.

Students, teachers, founders, and all, everyone's ages were in constant flux now, the ghosts going from flesh to spirit and back as others flickered in and out of existence like mayflies.  Everyone but Dumbledore and Filch.  The two old men stood in a small pool of certainty – one the most powerful wizard in Hogwarts, clad in robes that spoke of power – the other a Squib, wearing the same draggled coat he always wore as he mopped the floors that had been muddied by scores of students.

            "I require your assistance, Caretaker Filch," Dumbledore said formally, inclining his head respectfully.  "There is a spell which must be cast."

            Filch shifted uncertainly from foot to foot.  "_My_ assistance, Professor?"  His voice rasped more than usual, and his cheeks darkened under the stubble of his whiskers.  "There's plenty of Caretakers as has been here before me to choose from," he pointed out, waving a work-roughened hand at the presence of several other wizards in practical, work-stained robes whose ages were shifting more slowly than most.  "When it comes to spells..."

            "For this spell, Argus, it is _your_ assistance I need, and none other.  But it must be given with a whole heart."  Dumbledore's eyes twinkled, although his expression kept its formality.  "Do you accept the task?"

            Filch stared and scowled, but then his lamplike eyes softened and he straightened his shoulders to make a formal bow.  "I do indeed, Headmaster.  With all my heart."

            Dumbledore smiled.  "Thank you," he told Filch and then turned his attention to the rest of the hall.  "Is everyone here, then?"

"Yes, Professor Dumbledore," a first year still standing at the chalkboard called in a self-important soprano.

"Very well.  Mr. Filch?"  The Headmaster held out a hand, which Filch took with a scowl of concentration.  Dumbledore passed his wand over the clasped hands and then he and Filch simultaneously stepped back, a twist of white silk growing in the space between their hands.   They kept walking backwards, and as they did, the silk strengthened until it was as thick as a clothesline, but still lengthening all the while.  When they were about six feet apart, the two men began to swing the line in a circle, like children playing with a skipping rope.

A tiny witch darted into the circle, clapping her hands with delight as she jumped into the middle of the rope's blurring white arc and chanting.  "Andy Spandy, sugardy candy, French Almond Rock.  Bread and butter for your supper's all your mother's got!"  

Filch and Dumbledore were still moving backwards, and as the distance between them grew, another witch, not much older than the first one, dashed out to skip, chanting "Sugar for the cauldron, honey for the brew...." and then another skipper and another rhyme, and another and another. Harry saw the small Pavarti sisters jumping with joined hands, long braids bobbing against their backs with each jump.  

"These clothes are too heavy," said a sad voice at his elbow, and he turned to find McGonagall quite young again, looking wistfully at the others.  "and too big."

On impulse, Harry drew his wand.  "_Semper conformae," _ he cast, hoping he'd got the Latin right.  McGonagall giggled as her armor shrank to fit her nine-year-old self and darted clanking off to join the others.

"Well done, Mr. Potter!" said Professor Flitwick.  

"I'm surprised it worked," Draco said with a sour expression.  "Nothing did when we were outside."

"The magic's strongest here," Salazar Slytherin reappeared behind Draco, looking smug.  "Learn to read the flows, boy, and uphold the honor of your house."  The Founder's tone was kinder than his words, and Draco pulled himself upright and made a little bow.

"I shall, my Lord," he said.  Then he glanced back at the lengthening line of rope-skippers.  "I can tell that there are still some things we haven't studied yet."  His scorn was tempered by confusion and curiosity.  

"Well, it's not the way _I'd_ cast the wards," said Godric Gryffindor, cheerfully, stepping into McGonagall's former position out of thin air.  "But it has been a generation or two, and children will try new things."

"It's nae to do with the passage of time," Rowena Ravenclaw joined them, with Helga Hufflepuff  beside her.  Both witches looked highly amused.  "This is witches' magic, Godric.  Hogwarts finally has a Headmaster wi' the wit tae give space and time to what he cannot create alone." She cast a significant eye at Slytherin.

"I always made time for the ladies," Gryffindor protested with a smile.  The other three founders made inarticulate noises of disdain, but that only pleased him all the more.

"If' it's witches' magic, then why don't I feel like _I_ have to jump rope?" Lisa Turpin asked, watching the others.  

Rowena Ravenclaw smiled down at the small, intent face.  "Have all the women in your family been witches, child?  Able to pass along what they knew?"

Lisa shook her head.  "No.  My mother's a Muggle, and my grandmother only had my father and she was an Auror in the war.  She died before I was born."

"You see!" Slytherin pounced, sharp and sudden,  "You see what comes of mixing with Muggles?  If the wards don't have the power required it's because _you three._.."

"Hush!" Helga Hufflepuff told him fiercely.  "The wards will be fine."

"Of all things," Ravenclaw asserted, "A lack o' knowledge is most easily mended."  She raised a hand and a raven launched itself down from its perch on the rafters to land on her wrist.

"That is what a school is for, after all," Gryffindor said, with edged reasonableness.

"There are other considerations," Slytherin grumbled, but subsided for the moment. 

Lisa was looking uncertainly at the big sleek black bird, and Harry didn't blame her.  Ravens had beaks that were a lot bigger than owls did.  "If you like ravens so much," she asked, "then why is the symbol of our house an eagle?"

"The stonemason's chisel slipped," Helga Hufflepuff chuckled.

"And eagles are much better at keeping an eye on serpents," Gryffindor added.

"Eagles are less chatty," Ravenclaw said firmly.  "But there are times when a raven's memory is useful.  Listen."

Lisa's whole body tried to get as far away from the bird as she could get and still let it whisper into her ear, but her frightened expression changed after a moment.  "Listen to the bell ring..." she said softly, as if she were memorizing something.

"I know that rhyme," said Neville Longbottom, who still had the tray with the last bedraggled sandwiches on it, stepped forward, nearly spilling his burden.  "Gran taught me."

"Have you sisters, lad?"  At the shake of Neville's head, Helga Hufflepuff took the tray from the boy and deposited it into Snape's startled keeping.   "Come and jump, then."

"But it's a girl thing," Neville protested, blushing to the roots of his hair.  "And I'll trip and mess things up."

"Not with me, you shan't."  She took Neville's hand and the two of them went and joined the jumpers, with Lisa Turpin and Rowena Ravenclaw jumping in not more than a few steps behind them.

Harry looked down the length of the hall.  Ginny Weasley was jumping rope, and so were a few other girls he knew, but Hermione was still standing by Ron, perplexed.  There were a scattering of boys jumping rope, so it wasn't just Neville who'd learned what to do.  And there were plenty of girls not jumping, too – including some of the Slytherins Harry knew would never admit to Muggle ancestry – in a thousand years some families must have lost the thread.  But Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff didn't look worried.

Filch had backed up as far as he could go, his back was against the doors.  Dumbledore, already up on the dais, took one last step so his back was to the wall, and the happy cacophony of skipping rhymes suddenly focused into a single chant:

_"Listen to the bell ring, time to go to school __  
  
If you can catch the candleflame you'll prove that you're a fool   
  
But the thing that's worth a second thought and worth another look   
  
Is the world which you will find between the pages of the book   
  
And three's a goodly number but still we want one more   
  
The sum that makes us whole again is 2 + 2 is 4,"   
  
_The rope picked up speed, blurred doubletime, and the skippers raced to keep step and shout._  
  
"By sword and cup and wand and coin   
  
Square the Circle all hands join!"_

A the rope arced high, the skippers grabbed one another's hands and landed solidly, going flat footed and giggling in a long shaking chain.  The rope came down slowly, like a first snow; for a moment Harry thought it was going to hit them all in the ankles, but instead of slapping the against the floor it went _through_ it.

When it came up on the other side of the swing, it ran right through the arms and legs of the people standing nearest, startling out gasps, but doing no harm. Dumbledore and Filch began to turn the rope more broadly, paying out line to make the circumference of the swing increase.  Each time the rope came down to the floor it went through as if the floor weren't an obstacle to it, and came up on the other side.  Some people tried to back away, but in the crowded room there wasn't anywhere to go. Two more rotations and the spin of the magical line reached Harry; he felt a cold rush of magic as the rope passed right up from the floor at his feet, the spell dividing him into almost even halves as it went on its way.

            The light changed. For one swing of the magical line, Harry saw the Great Hall in strange vivid and uncertain relief, differently from each eye as if he'd put on 3-D glasses backwards.  His left eye, now inside the circumference of the wards, saw the colors brighter and steadier, the people realer somehow than the people still outside the spell.  Auras -- which he'd never quite believed in when Trelawney talked about them -- glowed, this one like moonlight, and that one like a candle flame.  Dumbledore was a small sun, Filch a catseye in the dark.  Harry looked for his friends, past McGonagall's tawny warmth, Snape's moonlight-on-water and Draco's cold blue icelight; he saw Neville's aura spurting jet-flames from scarlet-coal-under-ashes, Dean's feathery rainbow and Seamus' green-gold glittering -- and there was Ron's light, lemonbright and steady and Hermione's blue as the sky in autumn.  Where their two auras touched they blended into a promise of spring.  And then the spell line passed around again, and Harry was entirely within the wards.  The auras were hidden, and he could no longer see the difference between what was inside the circle and what was outside. 

            At least, not in the people.  Overhead, the whirlwind re-appeared, and Harry saw it shot through with colors – reds and blues, oranges and greens, but mostly the gray of the castle walls – twisted like strands of wool in a length of yarn.  And where it gyrated against the roof... 

Harry swallowed hard.  That wasn't the remains of the spell of night sky, that was... that was the black nothingness beyond the edge of the world, visible through stone worn as thin as old cloth.

*****

Author note:  I was truly hoping to finish before OotP came out, but I didn't manage it.  The Founders don't seem to be able to show their noses without a conversation! There's not much left to go, honest, but I thought I should post this as a promise that I still intend to finish, even if I have to put an "alternate universe" label on the darn thing...


	23. All Hands

Balance: by rabbit

Author notes -- check the reviews in a day or so and I'll see what I can do.

Disclaimer: 'Tisn't mine, 'tis true. Thanks to Ozma for letting me borrow her view of Filch, Ariana Deralte for her Uric the Oddball, and JKRowling who started it all... but especially Jinx and Moonbeam, for whose sake I picked up my pen once more.

Chapter 23: All Hands

"Don't just stand there!" a piping voice demanded, and small hands tugged at Harry's fingers. "Into the dance with you!"

"Dance?" Harry wondered, dragging his attention down to the source of the command. Flitwick was even tinier as a child, no taller than Harry's knee, on which that thumbling pushed with all his small strength so that Harry found himself stumbling forward. Once his feet were in motion they would not stop, and he collided with someone, a girl he did not know, and found himself tangled with her in an awkward foxtrot.

He changed partners, dipping like a crane to catch the hand of a small girl who was still standing flatfooted in the row of ropeskippers. The girl he had been dancing with linked arms with Neville and they spun away like marbleshot, careening off people who took motion and began to dance as well.

All across the great stone floor there were pockets of people in motion, pulling others into a growing terpsichorean tumult of swirling partners and frantic soloists. A conga line snaked by, uninterrupted by nimble limboists. A dozen wizards morrissed solemnly in the distance, clacking wands together with enough force that Harry's hands stung in sympathy.

Harry's partner grew to a more comfortable size as they polkaed their way through the crowd, scattering new dancers in their wake. They danced past people he knew: Dean Thomas gyrating on his back to the giggles of a Ravenclaw witch, Seamus laughing as he tried to match his feet to the jigsteps of an ancient wizard. Harry was startled to see Ron doing something that looked like ballet with Susan Bones. Flitwick had disappeared beyond the forest of legs, but Professor Sprout was jiggling about with merry abandon, grinning from ear to ear. Snape and McGonagall knifed fiercely across the floor, tangoing like duellists.

And all the while the line of the wardspell swept around through floor and wall and all, anchored by Dumbledore and Filch, and on each circuit more and more people were gathered within the safety of the bounds to stand a moment as wallflowers before being drawn into the dance.

Hermione was among them for a moment before melting younger at Gilderoy Lockhart's elaborate bow and accepting his offered hand with baffled delight. There was Professor Sinistra, who was twisting gracefully alone, catching and releasing invisible moths. And there was Draco caught up in four-handed fandango, moving with a practiced grace, as if he'd taken lessons.

He saw a red-haired girl and suddenly wanted to dance with his mum if he could, but it was hard to find anyone specific in the confusion. Witches and wizards weren't the only ones dancing. Above them owls and house elves had found the safe air within the wards, and tumbled in their own peculiar pavane. At their feet cats and toads and other creatures tread dances of their own devising. Round dances became square dances, rumbas twisted into mambos, partners changed, became soloists or were absorbed into larger dances that broke apart again into pairs and trios. Almost everyone was dancing now. Almost.

At the edge of the crowd, Harry saw Tom Riddle, scarcely eleven and wearing a makeshift robe, standing with envy and hunger in his eyes as dancer after dancer passed him by. _He should dance too,_ Harry thought, and was glad when Ginny Weasley skipped through the confusion to take the boy by the hand and pull him into the dance. And then Parvati Patil grabbed Harry and whirled him back into a waltz and he lost sight of the others as he tried really hard not to disappoint her again.

Beyond the wards the whirlwind still raged, forced back at each turn of the wardline, but crumbling everything else it reached. The ceiling was long gone; the walls were coming apart. The dancers grew more agitated; their feet sought out safe patterns but they could not do more than echo the chaos without. It seemed for a while that they would run out of room, Harry bumped elbows and knees, stepping over a badger to change partners and dances for the seventh time. He was knocked to the edge of the crowd, and yet he didn't fall. The stones of the walls were joining the floor at the edges of the circle as they fell, and always there was more room to dance, and less castle to dance in, until there were no walls at all, and all of Hogwarts past and present was cavorting desperately on slates grown translucent, suspended in wild nothingness.

"_Circulus Absolvere_!" Dumbledore called, and Filch stepped off the last solid stone and into the circle inside the bounds, twisting his bony frame like a cat to keep the rope turning. It trailed rainbows as it rose and fell, like a hoop twisting through soapsuds to form a perfect sphere. Around them and around them all, one last time the narrow line ran, setting wards ablaze with colors and light shouting defiance to the darkness while the rope which wasn't a rope glowed golden before vanishing from Filch's hand as the circuit was complete.

Everyone stopped.

Harry's breath came hard in his chest as he looked upwards, willing the wards to hold. _It's a bubble_, he thought unhappily, _We 're floating through Nothingness, in a bubble. _A memory came to him, from long ago in the school at Little Whinging: Mr. Hancock's voice droning over the whispers and teasing in science class about the thinness of a bubble's skin, how fragile it was, and why it was made of rainbows.

No one spoke. They couldn't have, even had they breath enough. How could the chaos of the dance have left them standing in concentric circles, the quarters divided by house as neatly as a pie could be cut by a knife? How could the creatures have found their masters in the mess, and come to rest on shoulders and in hands? Harry glanced at Hedwig and saw her feathers ruffling as if drawn by static, and he realized how strange the air felt in here, as if it were peculiarly dense and rich. It throbbed with power.

The floor felt level under Harry's feet, but looked terraced to his eyes, as if the center of the circle had sagged toward the base of the sphere, and each of the circles partway descended in turn, like the tiers of a medieval operating room. There were almost no adults now, just a few scattered through the rows after rows of students and eight at the center. The Founders themselves, facing each other like statues, stood staring across the midpoint with wands drawn. Just beside them were the four current Heads of House: McGonagall next to Gryffindor and Flitwick beside Ravenclaw, a tiny green parrot on his shoulder; across the circle from them were Sprout, with a rabbit snuggled into the bodice of her grass-stained apron, and Snape, a barn owl huddled on his shoulder, its pale face and dark eyes making them strange twins.

It was like standing inside a witchball. Harry was almost at the edge of the crowd, but he could see every face clearly, even the most distant. across the way the Slytherins ranged before him, proud and young, and he was surprised to see his own wayward hair on not a few heads. He looked again and recognized them now – not just Blacks and Malfoys, but Potters, Weasleys, Longbottoms and all – even a girl with Dumbledore's eyes. The families were scattered through Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw as well, generation after generation of wizards and witches, like constellations unchanging in the night sky. He could see them strung through Gryffindor as well, could see _everything_, even the back of his own head.

Dumbledore and Filch began to move, weaving step by matched step as they took their winding paths down to the bottom of the basin. They stepped into the central area at last and came to face each other, the rustle of Dumbledore's robes audible in spite of distance and impossibility.

"Headmaster," Filch rasped, making a formal bow.

"Caretaker," Dumbledore said almost fondly, returning it just as formally. He stepped into the ranks of the Gryffindors. Overheard sparkled the brilliant clear notes of phoenix song as Fawkes came spiraling downwards to drop the Sorting Hat right into the center of the cleared space, before alighting upon Dumbledore's shoulder and giving his ear an affectionate nip.

Filch hesitated, looking from House to House, and his cheeks went dark with blood. "I was never a student," he admitted gruffly. "I don't know where to stand."

"Well I don't need that scruffy old hat to tell me when I see a loyal heart," Professor Sprout spoke up cheerfully. "You're a Hufflepuff, Argus Filch. And you always have been."

Filch shot a wary look at the other Hufflepuffs and was met by a field of welcoming smiles. Mrs. Norris came out of the crowd to sit by Professor Sprout and that seemed to decide him. Cautiously, he approached the quarter and his cat jumped into his arms. He soothed her with one callused hand and then turned into his place, his leathern face cracking into a grin that looked almost painful as the buttons on his battered old coat turned to bright gold.

At once a change came over the Founders. If Harry had had to say if they'd been breathing before he would have been guessing, but now their robes took hints of the rainbows of the wards, as if they were standing in a prism's spill. Threads of light formed at hems and whispered forward, touching the Sorting hat. The patches and threads which held it together began to glow, green and silver and blue and bronze and yellow and red and gold. Between a breath and breath it unravelled, the patches flying every whichaway, the circle which might once have been the brim coming briefly to rest on Godric Gryffindor's head before disintegrating with the rest into bright dust.

The four Founders stepped out of their statue poses and walked forward until they made a tight circle of their own, each of them more real than anyone else in the world, as bright as illuminations in a monk's chronicle, all connected by a spiderstrands of light to a tiny opalbright tangle of magic which hung suspended at the very heart of the room.

"And so it has all come to naught," Slytherin said gruffly.

"Well, it's a knotty problem, sure enough," said Gryffindor, into his beard.

Slytherin shot him a glare, "Your precious dream has ended."

"Twas your dream too, Salazar," Ravenclaw reminded him.

"And it hasn't, you know," said Hufflepuff. "Unravelled, perhaps, but that can be mended."

"Unravelled?" Slytherin questioned, gesturing to the nothingness beyond the increasingly translucent floor at his feet. "There's not much left to knit again."

"A castle's a convenient home, I grant, but a school is more than stone," said Gryffindor. "'Tis flesh and bone. And hearts and minds as well, and of those we have aplenty. We have but to restore the patterning."

"That's the answer to a tangle, sure enough," said Ravenclaw.

"Something from nothing?" Hufflepuff laughed, "Aye, that's the best of magic. You'll help us, Salazar, as you did before?" she smiled at him fondly.

"Since you ask it," Slytherin bowed to her. "But I do not see where we should catch up the thread. Or how."

"We begin with ourselves of course," answered Hufflepuff. "It is our pattern and all must follow it."

"And as for how," said Godric Gryffindor, "It must be a dance. Nothing else has served as well to hold back this darkness."

"Aye, a Wizard's Reel," said Rowena Ravenclaw, "The one we danced tae when we set the cornerstones would turn the trick."

"One last dance for old times' sake?" Helga Hufflepuff smiled at Slytherin, and for a moment his age slipped younger and his eyes grew sad.

"I am not certain that I recall the steps," he admitted.

"I remember them," a small voice said. A young witch with silver eyes and pale eyebrows pushed her way past Snape and took Salazar's Slytherin's hand, looking up into his face with perfect trust. "I could show you if you like."

"I remember too!" "And me!" "And me!" Three more children darted out to take places by the Founders, giggling as they waved greetings to each other.

The adults looked down at them with varying degrees of approval.

"But will the pattern be woven strongly enough by children?" Godric Gryffindor asked.

"If not, then our dreams are truly dead," Helga Hufflepuff laughed.

"But how tae best go on tae those who will build the pattern after them? By strength or wit or heart or blood?" Rowena Ravenclaw asked.

"By blood I say," said Slytherin. "That is where our power lies. Bring forth the Families and let the Muggleborn move to the outmost circle."

"That pattern will not serve," Snape interrupted. He stepped out of his place to loom over the elderly founder, in much the same formal pose he had in Potions class when he was about to dress down a student. "For once we've started down that path we must identify the rest, find circles for half-breeds and quarter breeds, and so forth, down to the slightest tincture of Muggle blood. A thousand years have not devised a certain test."

Beyond Snape, Harry glimpsed Tom Riddle, sixteen and proud, his expression flickering from anger and fear to reluctant approval of the housemaster's argument when it became clear that his ancestry would not be called into open view.

"There's neither witch nor wizard here who hasn't courage enough," McGonagall added, coming forward too. She met Godric Gryffindor's startled glance with equilibrium.

"And strength of heart" said Sprout, taking her place by Helga Hufflepuff. "This is a task for all of us, soon or late."

"Go on as you've begun," Flitwick said, lecturing Rowena Ravenclaw blithely. "The one thing certain is the order in which we've come to Hogwarts through the years, so choose as you chose before. From there the pattern should weave back and forth through the years, some from your time and some from ours, for strength throughout."

"He has the right of it, you know, "Helga Hufflepuff said. "We'll all have to dance, soon or late. As these four Heads of House are last to our first, so should their youngest students come to dance with ours. Sixteen's a better number for the reel than eight in any case."

"Sixteen?" Harry saw a flicker of dismay skip through the four Heads of House who had defied the Founders, as they realized that they'd put themselves in the way of yet another round of energetic spellcasting. The Founders noticed it too, judging by the smiles they were hiding as they took their places in a row across from their

"So be it," said Godric Gryffindor and the other three echoed his words.

As if on order, the crowd rearranged itself, some stepping forward and some back. Harry found himself between Ron and Hermione, closer to the center space, but still able to see and hear as he had before.

Four students made their way to the front. They looked small to Harry, and nervous, the way that first years always did. But when they reached the Founders they all bowed and curtsied as neatly as if they'd been practicing for years.

Helga Hufflepuff laid a hand alongside the youngest Hufflepuff witch's face, looking into her eyes with a warm smile. "Yes," she said. "Here is strength indeed."

The other Founders seemed as pleased, and put the children into the care of the Heads of House, who stepped back again, to make room. "Watch us," Ravenclaw told them. "And you will know what to do in your turn."

But it was everyone watching as the Founders and the very First Years took hands and began to dance. First as a circle, and then as pairs they interwove, feet skipping a little on each step, as if they trod a country dance. Hand to hand, wand to wand, turning and twisting as each pair formed an arch for the others to pass under. The pattern broke apart, and reformed, with the modern Heads of House and their students brought into it. They made four circles in a row which danced their pairs through the pattern before intertwining, forming lines long enough to be seen, that braided themselves through arches formed of arms and wands and broke apart again as all the dancers spun out and back with new partners at their sides.

"A geometric progression," Hermione breathed, watching eagerly. "This won't take long."

Sixteen became thirty two, and thirty two turned to sixty four, and on to a hundred and twenty eight, and before long Harry was pulled into the pattern. He found himself smiling as he followed the steps of the dance. He touched twice a dozen hands as he passed up and down the circles, even Salazar Slytherin's, and yet no hand was different to him. And when he had run under the gauntlet of arches and formed his own arch with a plaid-wearing witch, he broke away to find someone else to bring in with a laugh bubbling up in his throat. A part of him wondered how the line would fit inside the bubble, but he didn't really care.

In time a round of the dance reached its end and the pattern changed, for when the Founders ran the gauntlet they glowed with inner light, and the creatures which danced at their feet or flew over their heads glowed too, until they reached the arch the Very First Years, now tall and proud, had formed foursquare of wands raised high, and there they vanished.

And yet the dance went on. In the next round it was the Very First Years who vanished in their turn. And so the progression continued. Though more dancers were pulled in each round as breathless youngsters, a portion of the students, grown to the cusp of adulthood vanished each time the arches formed, though sometimes they reappeared as ghosts on the far side of the arch and turned to join the House Elves, who had conjured instruments and were spinning music to match the rhythmic stamp of feet, as they danced a counterpoint in the air. And some flickered in age and stayed and danced as adults, teachers and heads of houses and headmasters and headmistresses. Harry wondered how long the dance could go on, and how Filch had joined it when he never was a student, and whether he would miss his steps from weariness before he'd stepped the pattern yet another time.

And then he noticed that the walls were rising.

"It's working!" someone shouted, and the laughter rang out. Harry, passing Draco, grinned and was grinned at in return before the Slytherin caught himself and tried to sneer. But Harry had moved on. He danced beside Hagrid for a moment, and found his hand caught up once by a laughing girl of seventeen who had his own green eyes and something of Aunt Petunia's eyebrows. The walls grew higher. Lucius Malfoy promenaded through the arch and disappeared. Neville Longbottom danced past, his face flushed and happier than ever Harry had seen it.

The walls were higher now, and torches filled the sconces on the pillars, flaming green and gold, red and blue. If anything the pace grew faster. The ceiling began to take shape.

Harry knew almost every face now. Tom Riddle was gone, vanished like the rest, and only Remus Lupin remained of the Gryffindors of Harry's parents' year. Their was no one left to join the dance, but the circles formed again and again, as the remaining visitors passed through the pattern and were gone. The last to vanish was Cedric Diggory.

The dancers broke apart.

The music stopped.

For a moment all was dark.

And then sunlight – true, glorious, unmistakable sunlight - flooded in the clerestory windows and through the great panels of stained glass.

A stunned hush, and the horrocks of their drawing breath and someone shouted joyfully **_"It's real!"_** Harry thought that was Lee Jordan. Someone else shouted "We're saved!"

And many people cried out gleefully **_"WE DID IT!"_**

Shouts of joy and cheering swelled to fill the Great Hall, rising to the rafters and the brilliant dawnlit sky magically counterfeited above. They studied this awhile but all gazes fixed hungrily upon the real sky visible through the glowing windows with their blessedly familiar depictions of Eagle, Lion, Serpent and Badger.

Hagrid stepped up and began to crank open the sidelights, allowing a rush of cool, pine scented mountain air to relieve the warm fug of too many bodies engaged in vigorous exercise.

Filch opened the great doors at the other end of the Hall and there for all to see stood the wall of the corridor beyond, as sturdy as ever it was.

The Great Hall was a still a mess, though, the tables pushed up against the walls, like barricades. Everything possible seemed to have been piled on them: books and plates and satchels and wrinkled clothing. The students were a mess too, their faces flushed and streaked with sweat, but they had the breath to go on cheering until Dumbledore clambered nimbly onto the High Table, and waved them to a happy, waiting silence.

"Excellent. Very well done, all of you." He bowed to the Hall and Harry found himself bowing back with all the others. Dumbledore smiled benignly at them. "Take your rest, now, and refresh yourselves," said the Headmaster. "As soon as the House Elves have restored the kitchens we shall have a grand feast to celebrate, but know this and know it well, no feast will be thanks enough for the gift you have given Hogwarts this day."

"It would be a good start!" Seamus called as Dumbledore drifted back to the ground and as if the laughter that greeted this remark were a signal, the crowd, so long one thing, broke into its component parts. Some headed for the doors, and some for the benches. Harry saw the four youngest students, who had danced every step of every permutation, smile at each other before collapsing together into a tangle of sleep.

Hermione was already going over to help Madam Pince rescue the books which had avalanched from the tables. Neville was sitting on the floor, staring at the Remembrall in his hands. He looked as stunned as Harry felt. Already it all was beginning to seem unreal except for the ache in his legs from dancing. Draco was blinking, as if he felt the same way.

"Everything's gone back the way it was," he said softly.

"Everything?" Harry asked, and their eyes met. It was Draco who looked away first. He put his face in order, like he was dragging on a suit of armor and raised his chin defiantly.

"Enough," he said. "Anyway, you needed us."

"And the other way round," Harry agreed quietly. "No matter who our parents were."

"Yes." Draco might have said more, but some of the Slytherins were beckoning him. He took a step in their direction and then stopped, looking back at Harry. "But I don't think they'll believe us, the ones who didn't stay. Without any proof they'll think they dreamed it, if they remember it at all. And don't forget, Potter, not everyone's been to Hogwarts." The observation must have been bitter on his tongue, from the way he spat it out. He nodded jerkily and stalked away, schooling his gait into its accustomed arrogance.

Harry wasn't sure that Draco was right -- but he wasn't sure that he was wrong, either. Still, something had changed, and perhaps, if they were lucky, it would stay changed long enough to make a difference. The Sorting Hat was right – they needed to work together somehow.

As if to echo his thoughts he saw Snape and McGonagall, Flitwick and Sprout giving each other small formal bows. The heads of Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff headed off industriously, but Gryffindor and Slytherin stood measuring each other with challenge in their eyes. McGonagall broke the silence, inclining her head slightly. "I'll sit down if you will," she offered, drawing two chairs over with a wave of her wand.

Snape smiled faintly and nodded acquiescence, took a chair and turned it around, holding it politely so that his colleague might seat herself.

McGonagall let out a faint snort of exasperation and daintily accepted this courtesy, and then nodded to the other chair, "Severus, _sit_. Before you fall down."

Snape unhinged gratefully, closing his eyes, and fumbling a hand along the empty pockets of his bandolier.

McGonagall drew something from a pocket hidden in her robes and nudged him with it. "Here," she invited. "I do, once in awhile, have the appropriate potion on hand."

Snape glanced down at the hip flask she was offering, and actually grinned. He took it carefully, saying softly, "Thank you, Minerva." He shook it lightly, judging its contents, and took a hefty swig, made an odd face and then coughed slightly as faint color returned to his cheeks. He passed the flask back to its owner, approving sincerely, _"That's good._ " He swallowed several times quickly, blinking rapidly. Muttered, "I commend you for having any left, after such an ordeal."

McGonagall looked almost victorious, and somehow fond. "I decided to save half of it for you, in the event of your survival."

Snape bestowed a pleased and private expression on the flask. "So I remain mysterious to you," he estimated, and his smile widened a little to include his colleague. "For if you really knew me so well as you like to believe, you would have realized the great incentive to live which I should have found in knowing, as I was dangling over the abyss, that you had in your possession a flask of century-old Scotch."

She only smiled back, brightly. "I assumed you knew."

"Harry? Harry!" Ron tugged insistently at Harry's sleeve, distracting him again.

"I'm coming," Harry let himself be dragged away. "What is it?"

"Look at the light." Ron waved a hand at the wall by the door, where colored squares of sunlight were sliding slowly down the pillars, and growing more diffuse. "See the way it moves."

Harry watched for a moment before he realized that he'd seen patches of sunlight move on walls that way a thousand times before. He shrugged. "So we've been up all night. It's morning, not sunset, that's all, or the light would be moving the other way."

"Yes," Ron said. "Yes of course, but Harry... doesn't the sun rise on the _other _side of the castle?"

—— **_fin et commencement_** —


End file.
